Overall Storage

• Visit Drive Storage to confirm how much storage you’re using in Drive, Gmail, and Photos.
  • Make sure you are logged in with your @ncsu.edu account and are addressing any storage usage in this account that pushes you above your assigned quota.
• Files and emails that are duplicates of data, no longer needed or used regularly can be moved to your Trash.  Items in the trash will continue to take up space until you empty the trash. 
  • Trash automatically empties items after 30 days.
• Review and remove any personal files or data in your NC State account. Using Google Takeout may help with this.

Gmail specific tips

• Visit Free up space in Gmail to search for and delete unnecessary or large emails.
• Narrow your search in Gmail by using additional search operators. Examples include:
  • has:attachment
  • older_than:2y
    • choose any time period using d (day), m (month), and y (year)
  • larger:10M
• You can combine multiple search operators.
  • has:attachment older_than:2y larger:10M

Drive specific tips

• Visit Drive Storage Quota by files to review and delete large or unnecessary files in MyDrive.
• Narrow your search in Google Drive by using additional Search filters. Examples include:
  • createdbefore:2023-07-25 owner:me
    • Format the date as YYYY-MM-DD.
  • type:video owner:me
• Move project, committee, department, or other collaborative files to a Google Shared Drive.
  • Shared Drives have a quota of 15GB per shared drive that does not count toward your assigned quota.
  • Shared Drives can only be created by full-time employees.
  • For more information, visit Google Shared Drives at NC State.