The open-source disk cleaner for macOS. Scans your whole Mac in seconds. Finds caches, logs, duplicates, and developer junk — Xcode DerivedData, iOS Simulators, npm, cocoapods, gradle. Detects APFS clones and Time Machine snapshots so you see the space you'll actually reclaim. Root-owned system files trigger one admin prompt, not 600. Keyboard-first. Inter-typed. MIT-licensed. No subscription, no telemetry, no nags.
Hey Product Hunt,
I'm AJ. Like every developer I know, my SSD fills up with DerivedData, iOS Simulators, and node_modules faster than I can remember to clean them.
The options I had:
- CleanMyMac — $40/year, closed source, constant marketing push.
- rm -rf — fine until you nuke something you shouldn't.
- DaisyDisk — beautiful, but a visualizer, not a cleaner.
So I built FreeUp. Open source, scans my whole Mac in seconds, frees up gigabytes with one keystroke.
A few things I cared about:
Speed. It walks the filesystem with BSD's fts(3) and bulk metadata APIs instead of Foundation's enumerator, and fans large targets (Xcode DerivedData, iOS DeviceSupport, Simulators) into a TaskGroup
per immediate child directory. Scanning 250k+ files takes about 5 seconds on an M1.
Safety. Duplicate detection does a head + tail + size-salt SHA-256 before the full hash, so container formats with identical headers don't waste a full read. APFS clones are detected, so "I freed 2
GB" means you actually did. Time Machine snapshots are flagged because they can hold bytes hostage after deletion.
One admin prompt. Root-owned system files (the /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports stuff) need sudo. Most cleaners skip them or flood you with 600 password prompts. FreeUp batches them into a single do
shell script with administrator privileges + xargs rm — one prompt, whole batch cleaned. Paths are whitelisted against known reclaimable roots before any privileged operation.
Built on: Swift 6 strict concurrency, SwiftUI, Inter + SF Mono, keyboard-first (⌘R scan, ⏎ confirm, ⌘A select all). MIT licensed.
No subscription. No telemetry. No nags.
I'd love feedback on:
- Category heuristics — which folders should I add?
- The admin elevation model — does it feel safe enough?
- Any UI nits (it's a one-person design effort)
Roast it honestly — that's how it gets better.
Mirror