You can now clean crap more efficiently with CCleaner v5.

Microsoft Windows is actually a great operating system, even though it gets attacked often. However, one valid criticism is how much junk builds up in various places of the OS. CCleaner, or Crap Cleaner, has long been one of the best tools to optimize your PC, and the new v5 update continues the fine tradition.

What's New In CCleaner v5?

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The big new addition in CCleaner 5 is a Disk Analyzer tool. Now, let's be clear, this isn't a revolutionary feature. Disk analyzers have been around forever, and they are a great way to free up space on your hard drive.

CCleaner has been slowly introducing a lot of Windows system management features though, which makes other software redundant. And that's what this new addition seems to be. Is it the best disk analyzer around? Probably not. Is it good enough for most users? Definitely.

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Found in the Tools section, just select which types of files you want it to look for (pictures, music, documents, videos, compressed, email, everything) and then the drives you'd like to scan. In no time, CCleaner will give you a detailed analysis of what is taking up space on your hard drive.

The pie chart shows the distribution by category. Click any category and you'll see a list of all the files, sorted by size. Select files, delete. Simple enough.

All About Cleaning Up Unwanted Stuff

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At its core, the new Disk Analyzer serves the base purpose of crap cleaner—cleaning up crap! For example, the Duplicate Finder, introduced in an earlier update, will show you any file that is saved twice on your system. And then there is the default Cleaner tool itself, which goes through parts of your system which you don't usually open, like temporary Internet files, thumbnail cache, and so on. If you've never run CCleaner earlier, you'll be surprised by how much junk resides on your computer.

If you are worried about CCleaner being a little over-zealous and getting rid of an important file, you can set certain folders to be excluded from its scans.

And then there are the other tools, like the built-in uninstaller. Again, not as effective as the best uninstallers for Windows, but good enough for most people. There's also the registry cleaner, but registry cleaning really has no major performance boost.

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If you buy the premium version (USD 24.95), you can set CCleaner to monitor your computer and alert you when you can save more than a predetermined amount of drive space. It will also monitor browsers similarly.

Is CCleaner The Best Cleaner?

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Windows has quite a few such cleaner utilities now. We have previously written a comparison of CCleaner vs SlimCleaner vs IOBit Advanced Systemcare, and there's also the new Glary Utilities Pro, which automates all these processes.

Honestly, there is very little to actually separate these programs, especially in the free versions. And I don't think most consumers actually need to pay for the premium versions.

Of all the options, CCleaner probably has the easiest interface, not to mention it is used widely enough that you will find help easily in case something goes wrong or you're stuck. Heck, it even has an Android version to clean your smartphone. Whether it's the best or not is purely a matter of preferences in interface.

Bottomline: CCleaner is absolutely worth downloading. Grab it now.

Download: CCleaner For Windows (Free)

Long-Time CCleaner Users, We Want To Hear From You

I've been using CCleaner for ages and probably will continue using any update they come out with. And I'm sure I'm not the only one. So if you're a long-time CCleaner fan, drop a line in the comments. Tell us what you love about it and what you'd want to change. You never know when a developer will be reading what you say!