The Perfect Digital Declutter: 25 Tips

AFFILIATE DISCLAIMER: I may earn a small amount of money from some of the products that I have mentioned in this post at no extra cost to you. Please find the full affiliate disclosure here.

Hey you! Ever wondered what it would be like if you did the perfect digital declutter? I know how busy we can all be with the things that go on in our daily lives. Wake up, school, work, sleep, wake up, school, work, sleep,.. and the cycle goes on and on and on endlessly. I would absolutely love to do anything that would help me make this “ritual” even just a little bit easier.

You remember I talked about how having an organized desk will improve your focus and help you to study much more efficiently? Well, same thing here. Having an organized digital space can help you in so many ways. So in this article, I’ll be talking about 25 ways for you to have the perfect digital declutter.

1. Clear up your desktop

You don’t feel like studying when your study table is messy, right? Well, it’s pretty much the same thing when it comes to your desktop. When your desktop has documents and folders all over the place, it doesn’t look that great – it’s really ugly. 😛 So tidy uppppp!!

2. Delete useless applications 

You’d be surprised how much storage space unused applications take up in your device. They slow down your device and they need to be gone!!

3. Clean up your downloads folder

We download SO many things from the internet, and it’s all REALLY random. One day it’s a school lecture note, the next day it’s a song we found. It’s all very disorganized. So take some time to sort out these files into separate folders.

4. Rearrange your documents folder

The documents folder is pretty similar to your downloads folder. All the files in there are from SO MANY different lectures, classes, and many years ago. Sort them nicely into their own folders and keep them neat.

5. Rename all your documents

This is a major tip for your perfect digital declutter. Sometimes when we want to download a document quickly or save something in a rush, we tend to type WEIRD names as the title just to save it quickly.

gcjhdshd.docx

final.docx

FINAL.docx

FINALLLLL.docx

FINALFINAL.docx

looks familiar? Well, me too! 😛 Take a while to rename them properly and put them back to their appropriate folders.

6. Backup all your files to a cloud service

Once in a while, back up all your files to a cloud database. This will allow you to not only clear up some space, but you’ll also be able to access them from any device!

7. Clear the trash bin

You might not know this but ‘deleting’ something doesn’t exactly free up space from your device. It just go to the trash bin (which is still in your device). You only make some space if you permanently delete them from ‘deleted items’. I know right.. so weird. But well, it’s in place to make it easier for us to retrieve it back in case we delete it by mistake.

8. Remove all useless extensions

If you have any extensions that you downloaded a long time ago and don’t want to use them anymore, you can delete them.

9. Organize your bookmarks folder

If you’ve been using your computer for a long time, I’m pretty sure there are many bookmarks saved in your browser that you don’t use anymore. Tip #1 is to organize the bookmark bar properly. Put all the bookmarks you use on a regular basis on that bar and then check the rest of the bookmarks to see if there are any that you don’t need anymore.

10. Clear your email inbox

I’m pretty sure your inbox notification is somewhere in the 1000’s… Take a while to clear them all and make that notification number zero.

11. Unsubscribe from useless mailing lists

A lot of emails in our inbox are ones that we don’t really need or even want there. The best solution is to unsubscribe from mailing lists that you’re no longer interested in. Tip: Search “unsubscribe” in your inbox and it will show you all the mailing lists you can unsubscribe from. This will help you with #10 as well. This tip will really help you with the perfect digital declutter you desperately need.

12. Disable unwanted programs that launch on startup

When we restart our computers, there are SO MANY programs that open up. This can make your computer extremely slow and laggy in the beginning. To prevent this, go to your settings and put a stop to it.

If you’re a Windows user, click ctrl+shift+escape and go to the task manager. Then, if you go over to the ‘startup’ tab, you’ll see a longgggg list of all the programs that run when you start windows. Deselect the programs that you DON’T want open on startup and click ‘disable’ or ‘apply changes’ or something like that.

If you’re a mac user, go to ‘system preferences, users and groups, and then login. After that, you’ll see the applications that open upon startup. Untick the ones you don’t need and then you’re good to go!

13. Delete duplicate photos (or even blurry ones)

Around 20% of our photos gallery is of duplicate or blurred photos. Delete them. One or two is okay, but altogether, they take up a huge chunk of space on your device! If you really want the perfect digital declutter, make sure to do this step!

14. Backup all your photos to a cloud

It’s always good to have them backed up somewhere in case something happens to your device. Better safe than sorry!! Google Drive and iCloud Drive are good places for storage!

15. Rename your photo files

Our photos are normally like ‘photo23_05_2021.jpg’, ‘screenshot22_04_2021.jpeg’, and stuff like that. If you take the time to rename them, it will make it easier for you to find and access them in the future. For example, you can have a ‘lecture slides’ folder – all our lectures are online nowadays and there’s plenty of screenshots that we take for future reference. It’s much easier if you can rename them and categorize them under a proper folder as well!!

16. Backup your entire device

Is it just me or do you always always always regret not backing up previously when something tragic happens to your device. If you have enabled auto backup, good for you. My phone stopped working once and I regretted not backing it up for DAYSSSSS… Guys, now that I’ve reminded you – back it up. Believe me, you will love yourself for it.

17. Update your device software (if needed)

I know that some of you prefer the software that you currently have, and there’s no problem with that. You can keep it. If you have auto-updates enabled to run at night, good for you!! If not, guys, remember to take note of this tip. It’s really important to make sure bug fixes and everything else is fixed at all times.

18. Turn off notifications from social media apps

Do you know that the #1 source of distraction when it comes to getting ANY work done is social media? Yes. Do you really need all of those notifications flooding your lock screen every single minute? Take a while and sort it. I’m pretty sure you can live without some of these notifications – likes, comments, and all; you can always attend them after your work is done.

19. Unfollow accounts that make you feel bad (or spread negativity)

Sometimes when you’re scrolling through social media, it’s very likely that you come across certain quotes or people that give a lot of negative vibes. Do yourself a favor and unfollow them. If it’s friends posting them, ask them if they are alright and offer to help them. If it’s quote pages, unfollow them. Spread positivity!

20. Organize all your apps into separate folders

When we download an app to our phone, we rarely ever sort them. We just memorize the location where the app fell when it downloaded or where you put it and then just go there every day. Sort them. Organizing will make it so much easier for you to keep your device nice and neat.

21. Delete unwanted apps

I’m pretty sure that there are many apps on your device that you are no longer interested in or you no longer need. Delete them. They take up a lot of space that could speed up your device.

22. Delete outdated notes and reminders

Sometimes I have random grocery lists or words or phrases I’ve jotted down on my notes from AGES ago. Delete the ones that you don’t need anymore. Also, reminders from long ago can be a bother if they keep popping up in your calendar. You can remove them.

23. Clean up your contacts list

Sometimes we take down people’s numbers in a rush and they’re saved as random names. Take a while to rename them and delete contacts that you no longer need.

24. Delete useless text threads

Our messages can sometimes be filled with spam messages from different people. Sometimes we get added to groups that we do not wish to stay in. Delete these threads and remove yourself from unwanted groups.

25. Update your contact favorites

The last time I added a contact to my favorites was around 7 years ago. You probably have more or different favorites now so take a while to update it.

And there you go! These are the 25 ways for you to get the perfect digital declutter to organize your digital life. Keeping the digital life neat and organized is just as important as keeping your real-life environment organized.

If you want more tips on how to be more productive, check out my article on a new routine that completely changed my life.

If you enjoyed this article, make sure to leave a ‘like’! Also, follow Smartiac’s Instagram account to see some really aesthetically pleasing content!

xoxo ♥