Hitting storage limits in Google Drive or Gmail is a common frustration for Google Admins. Managing storage efficiently while keeping costs under control and maintaining productivity is essential.
If you’ve ever asked yourself:
✅ “How can I free up storage space in Google Drive?”
✅ “What’s the best way to manage Gmail storage for my users?”
✅ “Can I avoid costly storage upgrades in Google Workspace?”
This blog is for you. We’ll cover how to optimize Google Drive and Gmail storage manually and how GAT tools can simplify the process to save you time and effort.
The Problem with Storage Limits in Google Workspace
As collaboration and data volumes grow, storage management has become a top concern for Google Admins. Here are some common challenges:
- ▪️ Unorganized Data: Duplicate files, unused files, old emails, and cluttered shared drives waste valuable space.
- ▪️ Rising Costs: Upgrading to a higher Workspace tier or adding licenses can significantly increase your IT budget.
- ▪️ Security and Compliance Risks: Unmanaged files or emails may lead to security gaps or compliance violations.
Without the right tools and strategies, storage management can feel overwhelming.
How to Optimize Google Drive Storage
Google Drive is often where most storage is consumed in a Google Workspace domain. Educating your end-users on how to safely manage Google Drive can help reduce storage consumption and improve their user experience by reducing clutter.
Some top tips to share with your users:
✅ Use Google’s Built-in Storage Manager: Navigate to Drive → Storage to sort files by size and delete unnecessary large files.
✅ Empty the Trash: Deleted files still count toward storage until the 30-day window is up and they’re permanently removed
✅ File Activity Panel: Users can easily check the history of a file, and identify old files that are no longer used, out of date or redundant copies of other files.
✅ Reorganize Shared Drives: Clean up clutter and survey your users to check if any Shared Drives are no longer in use and can be deleted.
Google Admins also have the following tools which can help you manage how storage is consumed across your Workspace environment:
✅ Google Vault Retention Policies: Configure retention rules in Google Vault to automatically purge old data. But remember it’s important to communicate with your users first and conduct thorough testing as a misconfigured rule could permanently delete your users’ actively used files!
✅ Set storage limits for your users: Set default storage limits for all users, and override for your ‘power users’ when needed. This helps you to keep a handle on storage growth and help you to understand which users in your organization consume the most storage!
How to Find Storage Used in Google Drive with GAT+
GAT+ provides an in-depth Audit tool for any Google Workspace domain with unmatched Google Drive reporting capabilities. Google Admins can easily search their entire Google Drive environment to find unused files, files over a certain data size, users nearing their storage quota, and even easily send file owners customisable emails asking them to check if a file can be deleted.
GAT+ enables admins to track storage usage at a highly granular level, search by file type, last edit date, last access date, Shared Drive files, by Google Group, Org Unit – the list goes on!
✅ Quota used by individual users, Groups, or Org Units: Learn more here
✅ Find files by last access, last modified date, and much more: Learn more here
✅ Create Scheduled Reports to monitor storage usage on an ongoing basis: Learn more here
✅ Customize and send emails to end-users with a list of inactive files: Learn more here. (Admins often use this feature during data access reviews. With the report-only option, you can ensure no permission changes occur while tailoring the email to your needs!) Learn more here
Top Strategies to Optimize Gmail Storage
Emails may seem small, but large attachments and outdated messages accumulate quickly.
Here are some tips to share with your users on how to clean up Gmail manually:
✅ Use Gmail’s Storage Breakdown: Go to Settings → Storage to see what’s using the most space.
✅ Bulk Delete Old Emails: Search for older_than:1y to find emails older than a year and delete them.
✅ Find and Remove Large Attachments: Use has: attachment larger:10M to locate and delete big emails.
✅ Empty Spam and Trash: Just like in Drive, deleted emails will continue to count toward storage limits until they’re permanently deleted after 30 days.
Google Admins can also set Vault Retention rules to automatically purge old emails, and set storage limits – see ‘How to Optimize Google Drive Storage’ section above.
How to Find Storage Space for Emails on Your Domain with GAT+
GAT+ offers an Email Audit feature that allows Google Admins to:
✅ View Incoming & Outgoing Emails: Gain full visibility into domain-wide email storage.
✅ Run Reports on Email Storage Usage: Identify large email attachments and unnecessary data.
✅ Monitor Email Storage Over Time: Set up scheduled reports to track storage trends.
✅ Scheduled Email Audit Reports: Admins can set up automated reports to track email storage usage:
- ▪️ Apply filters in User Statistics to analyze storage use over time.
- ▪️Set the type to Stats by Date Range and Users.
- ▪️Define the date range and select specific users, groups, or organizational units.
- ▪️Schedule reports for ongoing tracking and optimization.
FAQs
1. How can GAT+ help me free up storage in Google Drive?
GAT+ identifies large files, duplicates, and inactive content, with the ability to archive data in bulk, notify users, or transfer ownership to a dedicated user for deletion with Google Vault or manually. It also helps you to clean up shared drives and reassign ownership of orphaned files!
2. Can I bulk delete emails in Gmail using GAT+?
Yes, GAT+ allows you to filter emails by age, size, or attachment type and bulk delete unnecessary messages to free up space quickly.
3. What’s the best way to manage storage for leavers?
Use GAT+ to reassign file ownership, archive important emails, and delete unnecessary data from inactive accounts.
4. How does GAT+ improve compliance?
GAT+ provides detailed audit logs and allows you to set up retention policies for both Drive and Gmail, ensuring your organisation meets regulatory requirements.
Final Thoughts
Whether you’re manually managing storage or looking to automate the process with GAT+, optimizing Google Drive and Gmail will reduce costs, increases efficiency, and improve your domain security.
Want to see how automation can make storage management effortless?
Schedule a Free Demo and discover how GAT Labs can simplify storage management for your organization.
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