If there’s one thing I’m excellent at, it’s organisation. That applies to my digital spaces too. With work and blogging, I’ve always got plenty of photos and downloads on the go so I need to keep my computer and inbox tidy, Here’s a look at my spring digital declutter checklist for you to overhaul your digital spaces too!
YOUR PHONE
Let’s start off with the device that most of us use the most. How often do you run out of storage space? Is your phone often slow to respond because there’s too much on it? You should really only keep the essential stuff on there. As someone who works in content and marketing, it can be difficult as you often need a week or a month’s worth of photos and various different apps just for content. That’s why I back up my phone every week and clear out the photos. All I do is move them from my phone to my external hard drive and then declutter that monthly.
Now you need to go into each app and declutter inside of it. Clear out your cache and search history and whilst you’re there, go through your following list and see if there are any accounts you no longer enjoy. The last time I did this, I found a bunch of deleted accounts and inactive ones. Don’t forget to delete your browser history too.
While you’re at it, treat yourself to a new phone background. Make one yourself on Canva or search Pinterest. Give your phone a physical clean with a computer wipe too.
- Clear out your photos
- Delete any apps you no longer use
- Delete any contacts you no longer need
- Unfollow social media accounts you no longer love
- Reorganise your home screen + app folders
- Change your phone background
- Clean your phone with a wipe
- Treat yourself to a new phone case
YOUR PHOTOS + DOCUMENTS
I find this the most tedious task of them all because I have so much in storage. I’m one of those people who rarely delete photos, screenshots and documents, just in case I ever need them. I try to start by deleting what’s already being stored on my laptop. In my defence, I keep my stuff very neat in folders but just don’t like to delete things! After I’ve been ruthless, I transfer everything to my external hard drive. I try to keep just the stuff I need frequently on my laptop.
When it comes to my external hard drive, decluttering it is always a quarterly task. There’s a lot stored on there, from photos to invoices for tax purposes. However, I’m trying to get better at deleting stuff I don’t need, such as random Instagram Stories I’ve saved or multiples of the same photo.
- Delete what’s on your computer
- Invest in a USB stick or external hard drive for extra storage
- Keep it organised with labels and folders
YOUR EMAILS
This is a project that I started in January and is still ongoing. I had around 10k email newsletters from other bloggers, creators and marketers. So far, I’m down to under 4k, which is amazing! It’s also the perfect time to unsubscribe from newsletters that you don’t really read. I try to do this now when they first arrive in my inbox, rather than at a later date.
When you’ve got everything looking minimal, organise your emails via labels/folders. I’ve got labels for blog stuff, work stuff, invoices for tax reasons, theatre + travel and general receipts. I keep receipts until the items have been delivered/returned and then they get deleted too.
- Unsubscribe from email newsletters you no longer enjoy
- Reorganise your email labels to make sense to you
- Go through any email folders and delete old stuff you don’t need
YOUR COMPUTER
This might be a surprise but the more you declutter, the less stressful it is. I’ve incorporated this into my Sunday reset because I have an older laptop and I need all the storage and speed I can get! I make sure to go through all of my documents, downloads and photo folders first before transferring to my external hard drive.
Every so often, I’ll go through my Internet favourites and see if I can get rid of anything. Favourites are useful for everyday stuff but sometimes, I’ll favourite a page to go back to but never do. One of my worst habits is creating a wishlist folder. I rarely go back at it and end up just deleting the full folder months later.
Don’t forget to clear your cache and internet history once in a while too as well as your recycle bin. When you’ve done everything you can think of, run a full antivirus scan (they often take over an hour) to clear it all out. I try to run a quick scan every month and a full scan every quarter. I’m on my laptop for over eight hours a day so you never know what it can pick up!
- Clear out any unwanted documents, downloads and photos
- Make yourself a new computer background
- Clear your internet history
- Go through your Internet favourites + declutter them
- Empty your trashcan
- Run a full antivirus scan
I’ve made my spring digital declutter checklist so you can clear your own digital spaces too. It’s always a massive job to begin with but once you get yourself set up, it’s easier to maintain weekly/monthly/quarterly. Incorporating these tasks into my resets has been a game-changer for me.
It’s always best to make a list if there are a few areas you want to declutter and tidy. Don’t expect to do it all in one hour or one afternoon either!
If you enjoyed this post all about my spring digital declutter checklist, you can find my other minimalism posts here. Don’t forget to follow me on Instagram too.
