Is it safe to delete cache files on Mac?

Yes, mostly. The contents of your cache folders hold temporary copies that apps create to work faster, and apps rebuild them when they need them. Delete what's inside the folders, not the folders themselves, quit your apps first, and leave the system caches to macOS.

Quick verdict:

• ~/Library/Caches contents: safe to delete. Apps rebuild them.
• /Library/Caches contents: usually safe, but needs an admin password and gains little.
• /System/Library/Caches: don't touch. macOS manages and protects it.
• Browser caches: clear them from the browser's own settings.
• The Caches folders themselves: never delete them.

What is the cache folder on Mac?

A cache is a copy of something an app could fetch or compute again: thumbnails, downloaded images, web pages, update packages, compiled code. Keeping it on disk saves time. Losing it costs only time. There are three main cache folders:

The ~ means your home folder, so ~/Library/Caches is /Users/<your name>/Library/Caches. The Library folder is hidden by default. To open it, in Finder choose Go → Go to Folder (Shift-Command-G) and type ~/Library/Caches.

Caches grow because apps rarely clean up after themselves. Browsers, Spotify, Xcode, Steam, Adobe apps, Homebrew and other developer tools are typical culprits. On a Mac used for a year or two, several gigabytes is common, and some apps can push it much higher.

Not every cache lives in a folder called Caches. Sandboxed apps keep theirs in ~/Library/Containers/<app>/Data/Library/Caches, and some apps store large caches in ~/Library/Application Support. See Is it safe to delete the Application Support folder? for that one.

How much space does it use?

With macOS. Open System Settings → General → Storage. Apple explains the categories in Free up storage space on Mac. Caches don't get their own category: they are counted in the catch-all System Data, so this view tells you little about them.

With Finder. Go to ~/Library, select the Caches folder and choose File → Get Info for its total size. For a per-app list, open Caches in list view, choose View → Show View Options and tick Calculate all sizes.

With Terminal. This lists the biggest cache folders first:

du -sh ~/Library/Caches/* 2>/dev/null | sort -rh | head -20

With SquirrelDisk. SquirrelDisk is a free disk space analyzer. Click A folder, press Shift-Command-G in the dialog and type ~/Library. The chart shows Caches next to Application Support and Containers, so you can see which app is really using the space. From Terminal, squirreldisk scan ~/Library/Caches --depth 1 --top 10 prints the biggest items without opening a window. SquirrelDisk runs as your normal user, so it can't read some protected folders and may show them smaller than they are.

How to delete it safely

Use the app's own setting first

Many apps have a "clear cache" button, and that's the cleanest way, because the app knows what is safe to remove:

• Safari: choose Safari → Settings → Privacy → Manage Website Data, then remove data for one site or all of them (Apple's guide). This can sign you out of websites.
• Chrome, Edge, Firefox: use the browser's "clear browsing data" option and tick only cached images and files, not cookies or passwords.
• Spotify, Steam, Adobe apps and others: look in the app's settings for a storage or cache option.
• Homebrew: run brew cleanup to remove old downloads.

Clearing browser caches from inside the browser is better than deleting their folders by hand, because the browser keeps your profile, logins and history in separate files that you don't want to lose.

Clear ~/Library/Caches by hand

1. Quit your apps. Use Quit (Command-Q), not just close the window. An app that's running may be writing to its cache.
2. In Finder, choose Go → Go to Folder and type ~/Library/Caches.
3. Select the folders inside it, either all of them or only the big ones you identified. Don't select the Caches folder itself.
4. Drag them to the Trash. Some items may refuse because a background process is using them; skip those.
5. Restart your Mac. This lets apps and background services start fresh with empty caches.
6. Use your Mac for a day, then empty the Trash once you're sure nothing broke.

In SquirrelDisk, drag the subfolders you want to remove into the collector and choose Move to Trash. SquirrelDisk refuses to delete ~/Library itself, and it asks for an extra confirmation for anything inside it, as a reminder that this is app data.

Let macOS clean system caches

You don't need to clean /System/Library/Caches. It's owned by the system, protected by System Integrity Protection, and rebuilt by macOS. If you suspect a broken system cache, Apple notes that starting up in safe mode clears certain system caches, which are created again as needed.

/Library/Caches usually holds little. You can delete its contents with an admin password, but the gain is rarely worth it.

What you should not delete

• The Caches folders themselves. Empty them, don't remove them.
• Anything in /System. macOS protects it and manages its own caches.
• Things that only look like caches. Folders called "cache" inside ~/Library/Application Support sometimes contain real data, such as offline files, downloaded music or game content you would have to fetch again.
• ~/Library/Containers and ~/Library/Group Containers as a whole. They hold app data, not only caches. See Is it safe to delete Group Containers?.
• Preferences (~/Library/Preferences). They are your settings, not a cache.

If something misbehaves after you clear a cache, put the folder back from the Trash (right-click → Put Back), or simply reopen the app and sign in again. In most cases the app rebuilds what it needs.

Better ways to free space

Clearing caches gives you a few gigabytes back, and they come back as you use your Mac. Bigger, lasting wins are usually elsewhere: old iPhone backups (see Is it safe to delete iPhone backups?), Xcode data, video project caches, the Downloads folder and big media files. The options in System Settings → General → Storage, such as Store in iCloud, Optimize Storage and Empty Trash automatically, are worth a look (Apple's guide), and a disk map such as SquirrelDisk shows where the space really goes before you delete anything.