iOS 7 reveals iMessage's are hogging my storage.

gaanee · Jan 27, 2014

cynics said:
Yep.

First off there should be an option to turn off saving messages to a back up.

If Apple allowed finer tuning of a backup then you could weed out bugs that transfer with them.

Point in case this bug. It's annoying how "great" Apples backup method is until you have a problem. Then the first thing everyone says is "restore from new!".

Now I'm watching how the space is taken up with each message. Restoring doesn't sound like the best option given that we have to redo all the settings again (reduced motion, auto update, contrast..) which are spread all over and takes a good amount of time.
Is there a way to save the current settings, restore as new and then have all those settings?

numlock · Feb 2, 2014

does anyone know if this is being fixed in the beta?

i have a sms.db from ios3 and ios4 that takes up 1mb but restored into ios7 it takes up 5mb and then 6 messages later and its 9mb. i delete those 6 messages and its down to 5,5mb.

who exactly is working and debugging at apple these days? this is amateurish. 4 months since ios7 was released and still not fixed.

its bad enough they charge you an arm and a leg for the step up in capacity, or highjack your space when you have ios6 now something as minuscule as a text message thats less than a kb is few hundred times bigger.

cynics · Feb 3, 2014

numlock said:
does anyone know if this is being fixed in the beta?

i have a sms.db from ios3 and ios4 that takes up 1mb but restored into ios7 it takes up 5mb and then 6 messages later and its 9mb. i delete those 6 messages and its down to 5,5mb.

who exactly is working and debugging at apple these days? this is amateurish. 4 months since ios7 was released and still not fixed.

its bad enough they charge you an arm and a leg for the step up in capacity, or highjack your space when you have ios6 now something as minuscule as a text message thats less than a kb is few hundred times bigger.

Well the bug was fixed in iOS 6 but the aftereffects still linger. I think what you are experiencing is normal, things that aren't messages that save. Like when you type someone's name in how group messages they've been in in the past pop up and other stuff like that.

If Apple added a way to not back up iMessages to iTunes/iCloud then this would be relatively painless to fix. (Restore from back up). But they don't so the bug follows the back up around.

numlock · Feb 3, 2014

cynics said:
Well the bug was fixed in iOS 6 but the aftereffects still linger. I think what you are experiencing is normal, things that aren't messages that save. Like when you type someone's name in how group messages they've been in in the past pop up and other stuff like that.

If Apple added a way to not back up iMessages to iTunes/iCloud then this would be relatively painless to fix. (Restore from back up). But they don't so the bug follows the back up around.

in my case its just plain vanilla and unspectacular text messages ie no pics, only two group texts etc so for it to be 1mb in in ios3/4 up to 5-6mb now is nonsensical to me.

and continuing those threads in an equally unspectacular fashion increases the messages size a few hundred kb per message.

btw i had roughly 8000 messages in that original 1mb sms.db so something huge has happened at cupertino.

i just tried deleting two threads and it went from 5.5mb to 7mb. i deleted all and its 6.3mb.

but i agree with you on selective backup and would add selective export and import as well but i cant see that happening.

Speedracerxyz · Feb 10, 2014

You can selectively remove images/media attachments from messages by simply tap-and-hold on an attachment, then selecting More.., select any/all attachments you want to delete, then tap the trash can in the lower-right corner to remove them.

This offers a more surgical alternative to deleting an entire thread history and does have a direct impact on local phone storage on my iOS 7.0.3 iPhone.

cynics · Feb 10, 2014

iOS 7 reveals iMessage's are hogging my storage.

Speedracerxyz said:
You can selectively remove images/media attachments from messages by simply tap-and-hold on an attachment, then selecting More.., select any/all attachments you want to delete, then tap the trash can in the lower-right corner to remove them.

This offers a more surgical alternative to deleting an entire thread history and does have a direct impact on local phone storage on my iOS 7.0.3 iPhone.

That's because you weren't effected by the bug in iOS 6.

If I have ZERO messages as in everything in messages deleted. I still have messages using 1.7 gb.

Obviously there is no further way of going into the messages and deleting attachments since there is no message to go into.

SrLANGuy · Mar 9, 2014

cynics said:
That's because you weren't effected by the bug in iOS 6.

If I have ZERO messages as in everything in messages deleted. I still have messages using 1.7 gb.

Obviously there is no further way of going into the messages and deleting attachments since there is no message to go into.

Image

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My sister-in-law has been dealing with the exact same problem since before iOS 7 was released, but I finally got the issue resolved today.

First, she was still on iOS 6. So I backed up her iPhone using iTunes on my computer. Then I completely erased the phone (Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings). When the phone booted back up, I told it NOT to restore from a backup and instead, set it up like a new phone. Once I had an operating iPhone without any data on it, I was able to upgrade to iOS 7 (Settings > General > Software Update). When that completed, I used iTunes to restore her backup, but the iPhone was still out of space.

She had deleted all conversations in the MESSAGES app (so it was completely empty), but "Settings > General > Usage" still showed that MESSAGES was taking up 11.2 GB of space. So I downloaded and installed "iBackupBot for iTunes". This program can open the backup made in iTunes so you can view what is there and if needed, modify the backup files. So I searched the backup and under "Other Multimedia files", I sorted by filename and found a bunch of large files in the following location:

MediaDomain/Library/SMS/Attachments/

When I selected all of the files in that location, it showed I had 3075 files selected for a total of 11.2 GB. That was exactly how much space her iPhone was reporting as being used by the MESSAGES app. So I deleted all 3075 of them (as I said, she had already deleted all of the message conversations on the phone, so those 3075 shouldn't have been there). Once these files were removed from the backup, I again restored her phone using this backup (which was 11.2 GB smaller than before).

I'm happy to report that her iPhone is working perfectly again, she can backup to iCloud again, and she has over 11 GB free now!!!

numlock · Mar 10, 2014

SrLANGuy said:
My sister-in-law has been dealing with the exact same problem since before iOS 7 was released, but I finally got the issue resolved today.

First, she was still on iOS 6. So I backed up her iPhone using iTunes on my computer. Then I completely erased the phone (Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings). When the phone booted back up, I told it NOT to restore from a backup and instead, set it up like a new phone. Once I had an operating iPhone without any data on it, I was able to upgrade to iOS 7 (Settings > General > Software Update). When that completed, I used iTunes to restore her backup, but the iPhone was still out of space.

She had deleted all conversations in the MESSAGES app (so it was completely empty), but "Settings > General > Usage" still showed that MESSAGES was taking up 11.2 GB of space. So I downloaded and installed "iBackupBot for iTunes". This program can open the backup made in iTunes so you can view what is there and if needed, modify the backup files. So I searched the backup and under "Other Multimedia files", I sorted by filename and found a bunch of large files in the following location:

MediaDomain/Library/SMS/Attachments/

When I selected all of the files in that location, it showed I had 3075 files selected for a total of 11.2 GB. That was exactly how much space her iPhone was reporting as being used by the MESSAGES app. So I deleted all 3075 of them (as I said, she had already deleted all of the message conversations on the phone, so those 3075 shouldn't have been there). Once these files were removed from the backup, I again restored her phone using this backup (which was 11.2 GB smaller than before).

I'm happy to report that her iPhone is working perfectly again, she can backup to iCloud again, and she has over 11 GB free now!!!

The Economist · Mar 10, 2014

numlock said:
Image

Add a "Except when it doesn't" line right beneath that, smaller font size of course.

Chyna99 · Mar 31, 2014

cynics said:
That's because you weren't effected by the bug in iOS 6.

If I have ZERO messages as in everything in messages deleted. I still have messages using 1.7 gb.

Obviously there is no further way of going into the messages and deleting attachments since there is no message to go into.

Image

Image

I have a 16G phone with 4.4G of the "Invisible" Messages Saved. Ever since I updated to IOS 7, I have had strange problems. Now I do not have enough space for the 7.1 update. I am going to try some of the solutions here. Thank you

Fofer · Jun 2, 2014

SrLANGuy said:
My sister-in-law has been dealing with the exact same problem since before iOS 7 was released, but I finally got the issue resolved today.

First, she was still on iOS 6. So I backed up her iPhone using iTunes on my computer. Then I completely erased the phone (Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings). When the phone booted back up, I told it NOT to restore from a backup and instead, set it up like a new phone. Once I had an operating iPhone without any data on it, I was able to upgrade to iOS 7 (Settings > General > Software Update). When that completed, I used iTunes to restore her backup, but the iPhone was still out of space.

She had deleted all conversations in the MESSAGES app (so it was completely empty), but "Settings > General > Usage" still showed that MESSAGES was taking up 11.2 GB of space. So I downloaded and installed "iBackupBot for iTunes". This program can open the backup made in iTunes so you can view what is there and if needed, modify the backup files. So I searched the backup and under "Other Multimedia files", I sorted by filename and found a bunch of large files in the following location:

MediaDomain/Library/SMS/Attachments/

When I selected all of the files in that location, it showed I had 3075 files selected for a total of 11.2 GB. That was exactly how much space her iPhone was reporting as being used by the MESSAGES app. So I deleted all 3075 of them (as I said, she had already deleted all of the message conversations on the phone, so those 3075 shouldn't have been there). Once these files were removed from the backup, I again restored her phone using this backup (which was 11.2 GB smaller than before).

I'm happy to report that her iPhone is working perfectly again, she can backup to iCloud again, and she has over 11 GB free now!!!

Thank you for this write-up. Based on what I've read, here and elsewhere, those attachments are only left "orphaned" if/when you'd deleted the messages that contained them, in iOS 6 and earlier. I also recall reading that it was fixed in iOS 6.1. I suppose I was hoping that a subsequent upgrade (say, to iOS 7) would sweep that directory and clean out any orphaned attachment files left behind -- and now I see that's not the case.

I'll be checking out my iPhone and its backup to see what's up with my MediaDomain/Library/SMS/Attachments/ directory. At least now it's good to know there's a manual method to take care of things, and that iBackupBot actually works. I've always really disliked Apple's stock restore solution of "all or nothing." It makes troubleshooting stuff like this nearly impossible!

Thanks again for the details.

RemoWilliams1 · Jul 11, 2014

Three Cheers for Stratus Fear

Stratus Fear said:
This. Apparently there was a bug between 6.0 an 6.1 that caused attachments to not get deleted when conversations were. It hit me too, I had 900MB left over down from 3GB after clearing all my convo history. If you want to clear all this out without losing any other data, back up your phone to iTunes and use something like iBackupBot or similar to delete everything in HomeDomain/Library/SMS and MediaDomain/Library/SMS in your backup and then erase and restore your phone with this edited backup (make sure you make a copy of the backup before you do this in case something fails with the backup editor).

I registered to simply say the following: STRATUS FEAR YOU ROCK!! This worked like a charm. I just gained back 2.5 wasted GB on a 16 GB phone.

The Doctor11 · Jul 12, 2014

I don't have nearly as much. Good thing cuz I don't have much space.

Fofer · Jul 12, 2014

It's the orphaned Messages data to be concerned about. It wouldn't show up under that "usage" screen. It would be classified as "Other" in iTunes.

h4lp m3 · Nov 15, 2014

Simplicated said:
It's the attachments that are taking up your storage.

You're right, but how do we delete the photos/videos without deleting the messages?

iMessage is taking up 12.5GB on my iPhone. It would take hours (maybe even days) of scrolling to hunt down every single attachment, save it to the camera roll, import it into iPhoto then delete it. and delete it...

If only there was an app that could backup then delete the media from the iPhone. :apple:

Fofer · Nov 17, 2014

h4lp m3 said:
If only there was an app that could backup then delete the media from the iPhone.

I know of a few utilities that allow you to archive text messages from iPhone to Mac, either directly from the device, or via your iOS backups:

http://www.markspace.com/products/iphone/missing-sync-iphone-mac.html
http://www.ecamm.com/mac/phoneview/
http://www.macroplant.com/iexplorer/tutorials/how-to-save-and-export-sms-and-imessages
http://www.imactools.com/iphonebackupviewer/

Using any one of these utilities may help you. Grab the media you need, saving it on your Mac, and then finally setting Messages in iOS 8 to instead only keep messages for "30 days" or "1 Year" instead of "Forever."

That certainly would clear off lots of GBs of space on your device...

winnieo · Nov 24, 2014

it's definitely great that it's working for you

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PeachyK · Feb 6, 2015

So what do we do if we don't own a computer? I have a work computer that blocks iTunes and I'm not even going to hop on the hubby's Mac because I will never hear the end of it if something goes awry. I've always backed up to iCloud for years. Honestly I cannot remember the last time I literally "plugged in" to iTunes. I've had no issues until all of these updates. Have an iPhone 5 running on 8.1.2. I have maybe 10 albums (music) and literally 86 photos (I back up all of those up to Picasa). ALL of my storage is used by (saved) non-existent sms/text messages.

Before you suggest, here are the things I have done.

Yes, I've set it to delete msgs at 30 days.
I don't have background apps on (except for Google Maps and Spotify). I disabled Siri (she's annoying and google is way faster...sorry Siri). I don't use and disabled spotlight search. I don't use photo/cloud sharing. None of this stuff.

My phone auto-backups to iCloud every night. The things I have personally 'checked' in settings to be backed up are notes, find iphone, photos.
I've done the backup, restore from iCloud thing three times since August, but it is a PAIN!!! Any advice on how to get rid of these non-existent (saved) emails without a computer? I'd like to keep my notes, contacts, and to keep my apps/bookmarked websites saved on my home page. Last time, I literally had to re-upload all apps and it was a blast, didn't take but 5 minutes (totally kidding, it sucked!). Any advice?!

Just want these buggers GONE! These messages are nowhere! Even when I restore from backup, they aren't there but the space suggests otherwise.

Help please.

Thanks in advance. I appreciate all suggestions.

Cbish · May 18, 2015

I'm not sure if this solution has been mentioned before but I reduced the storage my messages were taking up from several GB's to 500 MB by doing the fallowing. Not sure if it will help everyone but it worked for me. After I deleated all unnecessary messages and attachments I noticed that when I went to write a text my phone had saved pervious "group" messages. I went through the alphabet starting with just "a" and scrolled to the bottom and found all the group messages starting with "a" and hit the circled I (information?) and then hit remove in the upper right or remove from recent depending on the message. After going through the alphabet removing all of these groups my storage being used by messages was down to approximately 509 MB. I'm guessing my phone was saving the content of these messages. I obviously don't know the workings of these things but this worked for me.

NewSunSEO · Dec 6, 2015

DC1408 said:
Not sure if this has a resolve, but it's taking 5GB of my storage and I cannot delete/edit. I delete my message threads regularly.

Not sure if I'm having a naive moment, but I'm unable to free up the memory. I guess a factory wipe would resolve this, but it's not practical at the moment, albeit I'm willing to do for the storage.

***SOLUTION = SOLVED***

I have had an iPhone since the first one. Apparently, as mentioned by others in this thread, the older OS's did not discard deleted messages or attachments in text messages. I had OVER 1GB of data that I was NOT able to delete / recover. I figured it out this way:

1. Download iBackUpBot
2. Create a brand new synced / backup of your phone
3. Open THAT backup in iBackUpBot
4. You need to find the directory System Files > MediaDomain > Library > SMS > Attachements
5. Delete ALL the files in that directory. (Screen shots attached)

Immediately after I had ZERO storage of the Messages (Saved) on my phone any longer. This software also found additional directories of images, which did not show up in the iPhone when I went into it from my PC through Internet Explorer. I deleted those directories and recovered even more space. I hope this helps a lot of people & saves a lot of people a lot of time trying to figure this out!!!

iOS 7 reveals iMessage's are hogging my storage.

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