A Guide To Digital Decluttering

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Digital clutter can be just as harmful to your productivity as physical clutter. While it may not be as visible to those around us, digital clutter can slow down our devices and act as a distraction when completing digital tasks. To help you to reduce this digital clutter, here are several virtual tidy-up tasks that you can do.

Create a centralised filing system

Have you got files stored all over the place? Having to switch between programs and devices to find the files you need can be messy. Consider a way to centralise this information. Storing information on the cloud could be a wise idea, as it could make information accessible from multiple devices. Specific software as found at https://www.templafy.com/ can meanwhile be useful for centralising business documents. You can similarly access such information from multiple devices.  

Remove any files you don’t need

Many of us keep onto files that aren’t necessary. This could include photo albums that we never look through or old documents from school and previous workplaces. Consider deleting these files to free up disk space. It could be worth clearing out your downloads as this is where many of us have tons of unwanted files.

Uninstall software/apps that you don’t need

Software and apps will take up the most amount of disk space on your devices. Uninstall any programs that you never use. This could even include programs and apps that came pre-installed on your devices. You can use uninstallers to remove any stubborn files as listed at sites like https://www.techradar.com.

Clear up your desktop/home screen

Make sure that you have only the icons that you need on your desktop or home screen. Modern smartphones tend to have multiple screens that allow you to prioritise the apps that you use the most. Unlike a computer desktop, removing app icons may result in the apps themselves being deleted, so beat this is mind.

Defragment your devices

Defragmentation is often necessary for keeping devices running at their full capacity. It can help to free up disk space used up by parts of files that have been misplaced on your hard drive. Many modern computers automatically defragment, however it’s worth double-checking just in case.

Tidy up your browsers

Internet browsers can often accumulate a lot of clutter such as bookmarks, extra toolbars and extensions. These can slow down the speed of your browser, so consider clearing out any clutter that isn’t needed. You don’t need to bother clearing out cookies as these may actually be improving web page loading speed. Keeping tabs to a minimum is also recommended.

Purge your contacts/Facebook friends/mailing list subscriptions

Many of us have contacts on our phones that we never communicate with, Facebook friends that we never interact with and mailing list emails that we never open. Consider going on a purge of all these contacts. Delete numbers you don’t need, unfriend people on social media that you don’t care about and unsubscribe from mailing lists that are doing nothing but clogging up your inbox.