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Cleaning Xcode Clutter: Reclaiming Your Mac's Precious Space. Best Free Tools for Xcode Developers!

Hazem Abbas

Sep 17, 2025
Updated at: 2025-09-17T11:09:37.000+03:00 — 7 min read

Table of Content

If you're an iOS, macOS, or Apple Vision developer, you know Xcode is your creative powerhouse, the essential IDE where Apple-centered apps come to life. But here's the dirty secret nobody tells you: Xcode is also a digital hoarder that loves to collect gigabytes of temporary files, build artifacts, and cached data faster than you can say "Build Succeeded."

It is a nightmare, trust me!

Xcode isn't just an app, it's your entire development ecosystem. From designing interfaces in SwiftUI to debugging complex iOS applications, Xcode handles everything. But every time you build, archive, or run your app on a simulator, Xcode creates temporary files to speed up future processes.

Sounds helpful, right? Well, it is, until you realize these files are consuming 20GB, 50GB, or sometimes even 100GB+ of your precious storage space.

The Hidden Storage Crisis

As developers, we're focused on creating amazing apps, not monitoring disk space. But here's what happens when Xcode goes unchecked:

iOS Developers: lose space to device support files, simulator data, and derived data from countless app builds. That beautiful app you've been perfecting for months? Xcode might be storing multiple versions of every asset, every build, every failed compilation attempt.

macOS Developers face similar issues, with Xcode caching frameworks, storing archives of every app version, and maintaining massive symbol files for debugging.

Your sleek Mac app might be backed by a hidden trail of gigabytes.

Apple Vision Developers (the brave pioneers!) deal with the newest challenge: mixed reality assets are huge, and Xcode's temporary files from visionOS builds can balloon faster than anywhere else.

The Real Impact

When your 512GB MacBook is suddenly acting like it's running out of space, Xcode is often the culprit. Slow builds, beachball cursors, and "Your disk is almost full" warnings usually point to one thing: it's cleaning time.

When Your MacBook Runs Out of Space: A Developer's Worst Nightmare (And How to Fix It)

Let me paint you a scenario that hits way too close to home. You're deep in Xcode, finally fixing that iOS bug, and then, BAM, your MacBook crashes to a halt. Everything slows down, that dreaded rainbow spinner won't stop, and you realize your Mac is gasping for space.

Welcome to storage purgatory.

When your MacBook runs out of space, it throws a digital tantrum:

The Beachball of Death becomes your constant companion. Xcode builds that normally took 3-5 minutes now feel like you're waiting for paint to dry. Twice.

Random crashes everywhere. Chrome won't load documentation. Xcode crashes when you're about to archive. Even Finder acts weird.

System updates? Forget it. Your Mac mocks you with "Not enough disk space" while Xcode's derived data takes up more room than the update itself.

The Xcode Developer's Piece of Hell, may be storage of shame :D

For you as an iOS, macOS, or Apple Vision developer, this is particularly brutal:

Xcode becomes unusable. Weird errors about temporary files. Builds fail randomly. iOS simulator crawls. SwiftUI previews disappear.
Git operations fail. Can't commit changes because Git can't create temporary files. Your commits sit there while you scramble to free space.
Simulators die. Need to test on iOS 17? Nope. iPad Pro simulator? Forget it. Xcode needs space to run these virtual devices.

What's Really Happening

Your SSD needs free space to work properly. With single-digit gigabytes left:

No swap files for memory management
No caching of frequently used data
No proper Spotlight indexing

Build times explode. That 2-minute build becomes 20 minutes.

Your Mac overheats. Fans sound like helicopters. Performance drops. (THAT`S BAD)

The Vicious Cycle

Low disk space creates this nightmare loop:

System slows → More temp files created
Apps crash → More crash logs consume space
You panic → Download apps that consume more space
Repeat until you're staring at "startup disk almost full"

Emergency Measures

When you hit that wall, here's what works:

Immediate Xcode cleanup: Delete derived data, old simulators, device support files
Empty trash multiple times: macOS holds deleted files in hidden locations
Clear browser caches: Safari and Chrome hoard gigabytes
Move old projects: You don't need every 2019 project on your main drive

Free Tools That Actually Work

The good news? You don't need to buy expensive cleanup software or manually hunt through system folders. We've tested and reviewed several excellent open-source tools that can safely reclaim your storage:

DevCleaner: A dedicated Xcode cleanup tool that intelligently removes derived data, device support files, and old simulators
CleanMyMac X: While not open-source, it offers targeted Xcode cleanup modules
DaisyDisk: Helps visualize exactly where your space is going
AppCleaner: Removes apps and their associated junk completely

But here's the thing, manual cleanup works too. Understanding Xcode's file structure and knowing which folders are safe to clean can save you hundreds of gigabytes without risking your projects.

The key is being proactive. Set a monthly reminder to clean your Xcode cache, and you'll wonder how you ever lived with that sluggish performance and mysterious storage disappearance.

The following list contains the best open-source free Xcode cleaner apps, scripts and solution that can benefit every Xcode developer.

XcodeGen

XcodeGen is a powerful command-line tool written in Swift that automatically generates Xcode projects from your folder structure and a simple configuration file. It is a must have tool for every XCode developer out there.

While it is not a cleaning tool, but it can help you optimize your XCode projects by focusing and generating only the necessary files.

Features

Generate projects on demand and remove your .xcodeproj from git, which means no more merge conflicts!
Groups and files in Xcode are always synced to your directories on disk
Easy configuration of projects which is human readable and git friendly
Easily copy and paste files and directories without having to edit anything in Xcode
Share build settings across multiple targets with build setting groups
Automatically generate Schemes for different environments like test and production
Easily create new projects with complicated setups on demand without messing around with Xcode
Generate from anywhere including on CI
Distribute your spec amongst multiple files for easy sharing and overriding
Easily create multi-platform frameworks
Integrate Carthage frameworks without any work

You can install it from source, or using Homebrew

brew install xcodegen

Cleaner for Xcode

This app helps you to make your Xcode faster by removing unwanted and deprecated files. You can run cleaner weekly or monthly to keep your developer folder health and to save more disk space.