Are you too annoyed by the digital mess and are looking for ways to get rid of it? Then, my friend, you have landed in the right place. Read on this blog to find the best digital declutter ideas.
In this digital era, we live on our phones for everything. Whether it is using it as a reminder for prime events, tracking our fitness, attending office meetings, paying our bills, or connecting with our loved ones,
But one thing that also comes along with it is the abundance of data. It does not matter if the data is on your phone or on your cloud device; not maintaining it regularly can become clutter, just like in our homes, and can severely negatively impact our well-being.
In fact, according to a research paper, digital hoarding is related to a diversity of mental health problems. So, digital decluttering is not a choice but more of a need of the hour.
But how do you do it?
We understand that with such a plenitude of unprocessed information, starting out the process can be overwhelming.
That is why we are here. To help you with this mess.
In this blog, we will share the 8 bite-size best digital declutter tips that will help you get rid of unwanted litter, organize your online life, and will also boost your productivity.
How to do digital clutter?
Organize your digital folders
One of the best and easiest ways to start your digital decluttering process is to organize your folders on your phone and computer. This will help you locate and access the files easily, saving you time.
For instance, I have different folders on my phone for educational documents, finances, photos, home bills, and more. I have even created sub-folders within my photo and education parent folders. This helps me find the files more easily.
Sorting out the digital files is one’s personal call. Some people have a knack for arranging them by categories, while others do so based on the importance they hold for them.
The bottom line is that, from email inboxes to your smartphone, organizing your digital files into folders saves you more space and keeps your system and you happy.
Remove unnecessary apps
When was the last time you checked out all your apps, ensuring you needed them? A long time ago, or probably never!
Don’t worry. You are not the only one ignoring this. It happens to a lot of people. Not giving enough attention to what apps you actually need for accomplishing your day-to-day tasks and what you do not eventually ends up leaving you with a lot of clutter.
In fact, your home screen is the first thing you see every time you use your device. Imagine the screen cluttered with a lot of unnecessary and unorganized apps. What impact would it have on your mental note? A bad one. So, considering this is the next step in your DIY digital decluttering process.
Delete all the unwanted applications from your mobile. Follow the same approach for your other digital workspaces. Uninstall the unused software from the computer. You might find some situations where you will need the software or app on a monthly or yearly basis. Keep them and delete the rest.
Next, filter, categorize, and move apps to folders or other screens. This will keep your digital space minimal and less free for the eyes. Needless to say, it will increase your device’s storage capacity and boost its performance.
Build a habit of deleting media (image/ video)
Be it a party occasion or you have some photography keeda inside you, getting that perfect shot requires a ton of clicks and even some slow-mo videos. This fills your library with a zillion unwanted files.
But do you ever erase them immediately? 99% of the chances are no, right? I made the same mistake.
Having this wealth of decluttered media not only makes it difficult to find the perfect picture but also consumes a lot of memory. This results in reducing the efficiency of both the device and you.
But not anymore. By starting to build the habit of deleting trash media, you can free up space and be able to locate the one that you loved the most before you trawl through the 1000 pictures.
To ease your journey, you can take advantage of productivity apps on your smartphone, like Cleanup or Cleaner. This will remove the duplicate files automatically without taking your manual input.
Unsubscribe unwanted mailing lists
Every day our email inbox is bombarded with a lot of messages from our loved ones, the workplace where we are working, companies that we subscribe to, and the ones that we have no idea about but are still ending up in our mailbox.
I know that for a lot of us, having unread emails left in Gmail or a flooded mailbox can be one of the reasons behind our anxious behavior. Thus, it has a direct impact on our mental well-being.
That jumps to our next step of digital decluttering. Don’t be overwhelmed just by listening; consider this your Sunday routine.
First, start by unsubscribing from mailing lists you don’t want or no longer need. For a rough idea, you can always check your spam or promotional folder. You can even set up weekly reminders. This will significantly eliminate your email mess.
Next, add tags or labels to the emails that require your immediate attention. You can even use the folders to better organize them. All these will keep your email inbox neat and organized.
Streamline your social media connections
Social media is a great platform to stay connected with our friends, family members, and like-minded communities. However, over time, we lost interest in some of the connections or didn’t find them relatable. But we keep consuming their information on our feed and cluttering our accounts.
So, it’s wise and worth it to keep going through your friends list and reconsidering who to follow and whom not to. This way, you will only get relevant and meaningful particulars on your account.
There are plenty of ways to declutter your social media. One way is to simply unfollow the least-interacting accounts and also have them removed from your follower list. Secondly, you can customize the settings to show feeds only from selected accounts. And last but not least, follow very specific accounts of your interest. This will help you mold the social algorithms to work in your favor, and you will only get the related recommendations.
Clear your web browser
One of the most overlooked places among users when it comes to digital decluttering is the internet browser. This includes caches, cookies, search history, and bookmarks.
For instance,
On average, an individual makes 3 to 4 search queries every day. This can even go beyond. Now multiply the number by 30. This means you end up with a minimum of 150 queries a month.
Additionally, every time you visit a website, a cookie is created, and your browser cache stores the web pages locally. All these lead to occupying more space and increasing page loading time, which is why it is imperative to clean time from time to time.
Furthermore, a lot of us keep adding bookmarks to the same single list and later find them difficult to locate. But you could organize them into folders and access them easily.
Schedule your time for digital decluttering
The job of decluttering your digital space can be very time-consuming and tiring. If you think that dedicating a single whole day would aid you in getting rid of all your digital mess, then you are highly mistaken. By following this, chances are either you will end up being annoyed due to too much data or even end up leaving the task entirely.
The right way would be to take 10 to 15 minutes out of your daily schedule and clean up the device. This will help you declutter your digital space without causing you any burden. Additionally, it will help you build a habit of purging.
Turn off the notifications
If there is one more habit you want to inculcate in your digital declutter process, then do this one: turn off the notifications.
Constantly receiving notifications from all sorts of platforms keeps our mental space messy and creates room for more digital clutter.
So, even if you can’t turn off the notifications entirely for obvious reasons, make certain that you are only getting alerts from the substantial ones.
Does digital decluttering boost productivity?
One hundred percent, yes. Having a lot of digital clutter slows down not just your device’s efficiency but yours too. Did you know that, on average, a person spends 40 to 45 minutes a day searching for the information required to execute a job?
Additionally, being surrounded by unwanted, crowded data can induce anxiety at your workplace and expose you to more cyber threats. Again, not a good sign. Thus, it is advised to timely clean up your mess. This will end up with less stress and overall boost your productivity.
Final Words
Digital decluttering is crucial in today’s world. It speeds up your devices, helps you find the essential pieces of information quickly, saves you more time, and keeps your personal and professional lives well organized. Consider this thing as part of your daily routine. Doing so won’t burden you.
Furthermore, all the aforementioned steps will help you take the first step and sequentially declutter your digital space.
So, what are you waiting for?
Start clearing out the unwanted data from your mobile apps, desktop, and tablet, and organize your digital life in 2024.
Having said that, we hope that you find this blog informative. Feel free to ask any questions in the comment section below. We would be glad to answer.
