# Check your disk usage
Source: https://docs.webgee.com/en/hosting/monitoring-disk-usage-with-cpanel





See how much disk space you are using and what is consuming it. Applies to
shared, reseller and Premium hosting.

Disk space is the limit most accounts reach without noticing, and the effects are
disruptive: uploads fail, backups fail, and mail delivery stops once the account
is full.

## Check it [#check-it]

In cPanel, open **Disk Usage** under **Files**. It shows every directory in your
home directory by size, including hidden ones, plus an **Other Usage** figure for
things stored outside it.

<img alt="The Disk Usage page listing directories by size with proportional bars" src="__img0" />

The bars are **relative to the largest directory**, not to your quota — a full
bar means "biggest thing here", not "you are out of space". Read the MB column
for the actual figures.

**Files in hidden subdirectories** is the row people miss. It covers dotfile
directories such as caches and trash, and on a full account it is often the
largest single entry.

The home screen sidebar shows the headline number against your allowance.

## What is usually consuming it [#what-is-usually-consuming-it]

Four things account for nearly every surprise:

**Email.** Mailboxes live in `mail/` and count against the same quota as your
website. A single mailbox that has never been cleared out can hold years of
messages and attachments. This is the most common cause by far.

**Backups you made yourself.** Plugin backups and cPanel archives are full copies
written into your own account, and they accumulate. They are also **excluded from
JetBackup**, so they consume space without providing recoverable backups — see
[What is excluded from daily backups](/en/backups/jetbackup-what-files-are-excluded-from-the-daily-backups).

**Logs and caches.** `logs/` and `tmp/` grow steadily. Caching plugins can
generate very large cache directories on a busy site.

**Old installations.** A staging copy, a previous site, or an abandoned
subdirectory from a migration. Easy to forget and often larger than the live
site.

## Free up space [#free-up-space]

1. **Clear old mail.** Empty Trash, Junk and Spam folders, and delete large
   attachments. Check every mailbox, not just your own.
2. **Delete self-made backups** once downloaded — see
   [Download a backup of your account](/en/backups/how-to-generate-download-a-website-backup).
3. **Clear caches** from your caching plugin.
4. **Remove old installations** you no longer serve.
5. **Move large media** to object storage or a CDN rather than the account.

Note also that WebGee's periodic cleanup removes some of these automatically —
see [Files WebGee automatically removes](/en/hosting/understanding-our-internal-auditing-and-cleanup-process).

## Inodes matter too [#inodes-matter-too]

Your plan also limits the **number** of files, not only their total size. A site
with hundreds of thousands of tiny cache files can hit the inode limit while
using very little space — with the same symptoms.

**cPanel → Disk Usage** shows the inode count. Caching plugins and mail are the
usual causes.

## If the numbers do not add up [#if-the-numbers-do-not-add-up]

**Other Usage** covers things outside your home directory — databases,
principally. A large database shows there rather than in the directory listing.

## Related [#related]

* [Files WebGee automatically removes](/en/hosting/understanding-our-internal-auditing-and-cleanup-process)
* [Download a backup of your account](/en/backups/how-to-generate-download-a-website-backup)