Storage is becoming more challenging to manage as media sizes grow larger. Keeping your hard drive or solid-state running efficiently is crucial to the upkeep of your system. Now more than ever, programs that help you to manage your ever-growing collections are essential.

There are plenty of programs out there to suit this need, such as WinDirStat. The ability to visualize your drive usage goes a very long way in making it easier to manage. However, there is one hidden gem you may have overlooked.

SpaceSniffer might be the last program you'll ever need to manage your drive space.

What Is SpaceSniffer?

SpaceSniffer is a freeware application designed to scan, sort through, and highlight larger files on your hard drive or solid-state.

It's portable, so no installation is required. The drive analytics visualizes files as a series of blocks that vary in size depending on how large they are. Once scanned, you have a quick reference of your entire system and powerful filtering tools that enable you to dig out the largest files and figure out what to do with them.

SpaceSniffer shares similarities with other data visualization programs. WinDirStat, TreeSize, etc. They all do something very similar by showing you information about your system in a way that is easy to understand.

SpaceSniffer sets itself apart by doing this analysis in real time. This means that you're able to see changes on your storage drive immediately without having to perform any rescans.

Download: SpaceSniffer (Free)

Using SpaceSniffer

SpaceSniffer is simple to use. Once you grab the files from the link above, extract the ZIP file's contents anywhere and run SpaceSniffer.exe. You can also run the EXE file directly from the ZIP file. However, this isn't recommended, as the program will run with limited permissions.

When you launch SpaceSniffer, you'll see a Choose your Space screen displayed. It will list all of your available drives, as well as the ability to pick a specific folder to scan individually. Once you select a drive, the program goes to work.

screenshot of spacesniffer displaying hard drive information

This is the main screen of SpaceSniffer, and it appears almost instantly. Unlike other data visualization programs, SpaceSniffer is always scanning.

As mentioned above, this is the program sorting your data into easily readable chunks. The blocks will be larger or smaller depending on how much size they take up on your drive. You will be able to recognize the largest files immediately. In my case, it seems I have a very large Hyberfil.sys file.

Related: Should You Delete the Hiberfil.sys File in Windows 10?

The first thing you may notice is an infrequent flashing across the blocks. Depending on where you're scanning, SpaceSniffer might already be detecting activity on your system.

spacesniffer-screenshots-edited-together-to-show-flashing

In this example, my AppData folder has flashed a lighter color, indicating Windows is using the data. This could mean data is being created or deleted.

Since it's my AppData folder, it is most likely flashing due to temporary files Windows stores in my cache. If you have scanned your entire drive, you might see the same flashing from the same location.

This is an excellent way to make sure SpaceSniffer is checking your data correctly.

If you click once on any of the blocks, it will change from displaying the folder's name to the folders within. If you double-click any blocks, the program will shift focus and enlarge the given folder to take up the entire screen. You can also right-click anywhere to open up the standard Windows context menu, allowing you to delete or rename files.

Learning SpaceSniff's Toolbar

crop-of-space-sniffer-toolbar

It can be easy to get lost in this program, so learning the toolbar is worthwhile. The toolbar contains many of the program's most useful features. Below are the core navigation and scan features that you'll need to use SpaceSniffer efficiently.

  • Depicted as a white box is the New View button. Pressing this opens up that first Choose your Space screen and allows you to scan an additional drive or partition.
  • The green arrows are Go Forward and Go Back. These help with navigation.
  • The button with a folder and an arrow next to it is the Go to Upper Level function. This is a helpful navigation tool, as it immediately brings the screen to a folder higher in the directory. So if you've accidentally clicked a few layers too deep, you can use this to find your way back.
  • Next to that is a home icon, and this is Go to Home. It returns you to the root of your drive.
  • Pressing the two blue arrows Performs a New Master Scan. This causes SpaceSniffer to start the scan from scratch.
  • The white file icon with gray arrows is Perform a New Scan of the Zoomed View. This causes SpaceSniffer to start the scan from scratch from the window you're currently viewing. This is useful if you've found a particular folder is full of junk files, and you need a more focused scan to sift through it.

Read more: Delete These Windows Files and Folders to Free Up Disk Space

Those are the essential functions of the toolbar, but SpaceSniffer has a few other features to help you understand your drive data.

Clicking either of the two blue boxes displays More Details or Less Detail. With this, you can break the blocks into smaller folders quickly or return all the smaller folders into larger blocks.

The three colored blocks icon is the Use File Classes Style function. This enables color-coding your system files.

The green star icon is Show Free Space. This creates an additional block to represent how much free space you have on your drive.

Finally, the ghost icon is Show Unaccesible Space, and the flower is the Donation button. Show Unaccessible Space is a feature that may not do anything for you if SpaceSniffer has successfully scanned your system. However, this feature can highlight where SpaceSniffer might not have permission to scan.

Unable to Examine Error

Let's say SpaceSniffer is showing unaccessible space, or it displays an error log when you begin scanning. In that case, there's a good chance SpaceSniffer doesn't have high enough permissions to scan your entire drive.

screencap-of-spacesniffer-error-log

This isn't a big problem. SpaceSniffer can do its job without full access to your drive; it will just be unable to provide full details on restricted folders. If you are encountering this problem, you can try running SpaceSniffer as Administrator.

To do this, right click the SpaceSniffer icon, and hit Run as Administrator.

If this doesn't work, or you don't have access to full administrator rights, SpaceSniffer should still give you a rough idea of what files are taking up the most space.

Keep Your Drive Tidy

Now that you have the tool, you'll be able to quickly identify which file you can delete to recover space on your drive.

Start by having SpaceSniffer scan around your documents or where you store media files. Program files and other common installation directories are also usually full of unwanted or lingering files.

Be careful when using SpaceSniffer around system files. You can toggle on the File Classes style mentioned earlier if you're unsure. You don't want to delete anything essential to Windows.

SpaceSniffer makes it easy to see what files are taking up the most space, and its realtime analytics can even tell you what programs create the most data waste as you use your system. However, data management doesn't stop at deleting old games or media.

You can do so much more to keep your system running smoothly with a nice, empty drive.