All iPads The capacity bar in iTunes is showing 4.7 GB being used up by "Other"

supermac96 said:

I looked through my apps and don't see anything such as video/music downloads in other apps that would be causing this. I assume this is well above what the "Other" is usually at. Can anyone think of any solutions to see what this "Other" space is and to get rid of it? I have a 32 GB iPad 2, not jailbroken.

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What iOS r u on? And have u restored it?

supermac96 said:

I assume this is well above what the "Other" is usually at.

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That is where you would be wrong. It depends on how the Apps that are installed store their data.

An example would be the Navigon GPS App stores the map data it downloads as "Other". That data can be several hundred megabytes.

i believe if you have .pdf files saved, it will go under as "other".

I wonder about this mystery from time to time as well. I am convinced that while some of that "Other" might be valid data for my currently installed apps, there is some (or a lot of) junk in there as well.

For example, a while back I installed a game that I hadn't played in a while. The game did not use iCloud saves. When I started the game up for the first time, it had all my progress and levels unlocked from the first time I had the game installed months ago. The only thing I can think of is that this particular game stored its save data in the "Other" region and when I deleted the game it deletes the app itself but not the "Other" data that the app has written.

I've done a backup and a restore before, that doesn't help because "Other" is part of the backup.

The only way I know to fix it is to completely wipe the iPad and resync your apps and data back on fresh...but of course you can lose a lot of saved games, etc by doing this.

Overall, I just deal with it...but I strongly suspect that there is some bad file management by iOS and developers behind the scenes here.

blackbear219 said:

I've done a backup and a restore before, that doesn't help because "Other" is part of the backup.

The only way I know to fix it is to completely wipe the iPad and resync your apps and data back on fresh...but of course you can lose a lot of saved games, etc by doing this.

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Doing a standard restore from backup doesn't clear down the iPad first so it won't clear anything from Other. If you do a Reset to factory settings and then restore from the backup then it'll only bring back the stuff you actually need - and you won't lose your saved games.

I do this every six months or so just to clear down the Other.

dancj said:

Doing a standard restore from backup doesn't clear down the iPad first so it won't clear anything from Other. If you do a Reset to factory settings and then restore from the backup then it'll only bring back the stuff you actually need - and you won't lose your saved games.

I do this every six months or so jut to clear down the Other.

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I'm going to try this, because my iPhone is about 25% other!

Interesting. I will check that out.

dancj said:

Doing a standard restore from backup doesn't clear down the iPad first so it won't clear anything from Other. If you do a Reset to factory settings and then restore from the backup then it'll only bring back the stuff you actually need - and you won't lose your saved games.

I do this every six months or so just to clear down the Other.

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I finally got around to giving this a try and it didn't reduce my "Other" space at all. Which must mean that it's valid data that I need, so I'm fine with that.

blackbear219 said:

I finally got around to giving this a try and it didn't reduce my "Other" space at all. Which must mean that it's valid data that I need, so I'm fine with that.

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Arse.

Well at least now you know.

its cache. Clear browsing data in safari should free up some space. When i did the software update, i shed around 2-300 mb.

It could also be people sending you video and audio clips in text messages.

If you send/receive lots of pictures and videos through iMessage, those are all counting towards your usage as well. If they are in your camera roll as well, you can delete them.

supermac96 said:

. Can anyone think of any solutions to see what this "Other" space is and to get rid of it? I have a 32 GB iPad 2, not jailbroken.

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Other is mail, contacts, calendar, messages, app data etc.

Some of it could be cache files from safari etc. a reboot or reset typically flushes that out.

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supermac96 said:

6.0.1, and no I have not. I haven't restored any of my devices in a long time, will it put all my apps/music/settings and everything back exactly how they were even if the music is not purchased on iTunes or not on my computer?

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Nope. Items that were brought over from computer like music, photos etc are not included in backups to iTunes or iCloud.

You can check under Settings > General > Usage, you can see what apps are using what space on your iPad.