Your Google Drive may be overflowing and you could be one of those users. This is due to an excessive number of files hidden orphaned. If the parent directory of a file is deleted, it becomes orphaned. However, the file is still accessible. If you upload a file to a folder on your friends Google Drive, but your friend deletes it later, the file that you uploaded will remain in your Google Storage and count against your data limit.AdvertisementThis is not a common occurrence, but Google Musics recent shutdown has significantly increased the chance that users may have left behind music and podcast files that were not properly deleted prior to the service's closure, as reddit users discovered.There are methods to locate and delete at least some of these files.How to delete Google Drive files that are no longer neededThese files are still visible in Google Drive's Storage list, but it is nearly impossible to determine which files have been deleted. This trick, via Workspace Tips, allows you to find and delete (or even restore) any files that are not needed.Open Google Drive using your browser or the Drive mobile application. Type the following string into Google's search bar: is.unorganized owner.me. Any orphaned files will appear in the search results. Click on an orphaned folder and click Add to My Drive to save them to your drive. Or, you can choose to remove them from your trash. To delete them permanently and regain storage space, click on the file and choose Delete Forever.AdvertisementI ran the above procedure on both my Drive accounts. It found 4.6GB worth of files.Jamie White, reader, thanks for the tip!
