Hidden Bastard
macOS Junk File Eliminator — v1.1
Free. Open-source. No subscriptions. No telemetry. Built by MDRN Corp.
macOS creates invisible files everywhere — caches, logs, build artifacts, old iOS backups, Xcode derived data from projects you deleted years ago. The Storage panel won't show you. CleanMyMac wants $40/year to.
Hidden Bastard finds them. Shows you exactly what they are in plain English. Moves them to Trash.
One scan freed 20GB on a machine that "had no space to free."
Older versions only looked inside a hardcoded list of known junk folders — so they could walk straight past the biggest space-hogs (a 19 GB pile of Xcode simulators, a 4 GB on-device browser AI model) simply because nobody had added that exact path.
v1.1 adds a deep "biggest folders" scan: it walks your Library and surfaces the largest folders anywhere, classified by how safe they are to delete — so space-hogs no cleaner knows about still show up. Plus a fix to simulator detection that was pointing at the wrong subfolder (Caches instead of Devices). Nothing new is auto-deleted; unfamiliar big folders are flagged review-first.
| Category | What it is | Typical size |
|---|---|---|
| Application Caches | Browser, app, and system temp files | 2–15 GB |
| Xcode DerivedData | Build artifacts from every project you've touched | 10–30 GB |
| iOS Backups | Old iPhone/iPad local backups, never auto-deleted | 10–50 GB |
| System Logs | Crash reports, diagnostic logs, app logs from years ago | 500 MB–5 GB |
| Developer Caches | npm, Yarn, CocoaPods, Gradle, Homebrew downloads | 5–20 GB |
| iOS Simulators | Installed apps & data per Xcode simulator device (the big one) | 5–20 GB |
| VS Code Storage | Workspace storage, extension cache, logs | 1–5 GB |
| Python Envs | Virtualenvs and pyenv versions that outlived their projects | varies |
| Incomplete Downloads | Partial downloads that never finished | varies |
| Trash | Files already deleted but not yet freed from disk | varies |
| Biggest Folders (deep scan) | Any large folder — even ones no list knows about: browser AI models, app data, containers | varies |
Every result shows a plain-English explanation of what the file is, why it's safe to delete, and how much space it's using.
- Download
HiddenBastard.dmgfrom Releases - Open the DMG, drag Hidden Bastard to Applications
- Right-click → Open on first launch (required for unsigned apps — normal for open-source tools)
- Scan
brew install --cask hidden-bastardgit clone https://github.com/ghostintheprompt/hidden-bastard
cd hidden-bastard
xcodebuild -project HiddenBastard.xcodeproj -scheme HiddenBastard -configuration Release buildSee BUILD.md for full build and signing instructions.
- Launch Hidden Bastard
- Click INITIALIZE SCAN — scans all known junk locations
- Review FOUND FILES — each item shows what it is, category, and size
- Select what to remove (SELECT ALL or pick individually)
- Click MOVE TO TRASH — nothing is permanently deleted without going through Trash first
- Check HISTORY to see everything that's been cleaned
- Your documents, photos, music, videos
- Application binaries
- Active project files
- System integrity files
The deep scan surfaces large unfamiliar folders so you can finally see them — but they're flagged high-risk / review-first and never auto-selected. And everything goes to Trash first, never a permanent delete. You choose what's removed; you can always undo.
Everything runs locally on your machine. No data leaves your computer. No analytics, no tracking, no telemetry. No network calls. Read the code — it's all here.
./make_dmg.sh 1.1.0Builds a Release .app, wraps it in a DMG with an Applications symlink, outputs to build/HiddenBastard-1.1.0.dmg. Attach to a GitHub Release.
- macOS 13.0 Ventura or later
- No special permissions required at install — app requests access at scan time
Developer (first scan): 20–70 GB freed — Xcode artifacts, npm caches, old simulator data
Casual user: 3–10 GB — browser cache, app caches, system logs
Long-time Mac user: 50–100 GB — iOS backups from old devices, years of accumulated cache
macOS Storage Management shows you large files you already know about. It doesn't touch hidden junk. CleanMyMac costs $40/year, is closed source, and upsells constantly.
Hidden Bastard is free, open-source, does one thing, and does it well.
MIT — see LICENSE
Built by MDRN Corp — ghostintheprompt.com
Your Mac. Your space. No junk.