My Digital Decluttering Trick Works on Every Single Device

When you think about the items cluttering your home, you might immediately think of the mail pile by the entryway, the “clothes chair” in your bedroom, or even hidden messes, like the ones behind drawers, cabinets, or closet doors. But there’s another type of clutter that’s just as important to address, even if it doesn’t feel as visible or physical as the rest. It’s the clutter that’s on your phone, laptop, tablet, and any other electronic devices — aka digital clutter. 

Consider this your sign to deal with your digital clutter. Here’s how to do it.

For today’s assignment, choose one digital device you want to focus on: your phone, computer, or tablet, for instance, and one specific area you want to tackle, such as photos, emails, documents, apps, or your home or desktop display screen.

To make this assignment easier, decide if you want to dedicate a certain amount of time (30 minutes or an hour) to the task or if you want to see one area of clutter through today. Then, schedule decluttering dates on your calendar for anything else you want to tackle. Below are some things you can digitally declutter from your devices. 

I’m guilty of having way too many photos on my phone — sometimes multiple shots of the same photo of my dog, screenshots of things I intend to look back on, or even the occasional blurry accidental image taken but buried way down in my camera roll. The best way to sort through your photos is to first remove any duplicates, unneeded screenshots, and blurry images (the photo app has folders for duplicates and screenshots!) on your phone or other devices. Then, it’s time to go through and see what else you’ll want to keep on your phone or upload somewhere else for long-term storage. You can use a hard drive and/or cloud provider, such as Google Photos, iCloud, or Dropbox. 

For photos on your computer, make sure to have it organized in a fashion you best want to access them — whether it’s by year, type of image (grouping photos from a trip/vacation, of family, or even because it’s all food pictures). Then, empty the trash (and decide if you want to permanently delete anything by emptying the recently deleted folder on your phone). 

Getting your inbox to zero is no easy feat, especially if you are dealing with a lot of unread or unwanted emails. You don’t have to get your inbox to zero today (unless you are challenging yourself to do so!), but you can set up systems to eventually cull your inbox down to what actually matters. 

Start by deleting obvious spam and unsubscribing from companies you no longer want to hear from. Search for frequent senders to quickly find and delete batches of emails you no longer need. Once you’ve cleared out some of the easy clutter, you can work backward through older emails and decide what’s actually worth keeping. I’m all for manually tidying up your inbox — it’s how I get mine to zero every time! You can also use apps like Clean Email, but there can be risks (shared data), costs, or imperfect cleanups. 

Much like physical documents, digital documents can snowball into a pile of clutter — but on your screen. You might even have documents scattered around in different folders. You can easily find documents on your computer by searching up “.doc” or “.pdf” if you’re unsure of where they might have all landed. Drag and drop each item in one spot (either the desktop or a single folder for now).

Once you have everything gathered in one place, determine what needs to be deleted immediately or organized. If you don’t already have a system in place, consider creating broadly themed folders like “work files,” “household,” or “finances.” Additionally, make sure to back up anything important to a hard drive and/or cloud storage. 

One of the fastest ways to free up your phone’s storage — and screen space — is to delete any apps you don’t use. Take the time to dig into what you use and don’t use regularly (in iPhones you can check your app usage by looking at the Screen Time section in settings). Once you’ve successfully deleted ones you don’t visit at all, you can go the extra mile and organize your apps.

iPhones have the nifty tool to hide away apps from your home screen, but still keep them downloaded. While this is great for reducing visual clutter, it doesn’t actually “declutter” the apps from your phone (resulting in them eating up your phone’s storage space). If you want a full inventory of your apps, take a look at the app store, under your user profile, and select apps & purchase history, your apps, and then you can see every single app you have on this device — and your other connected devices. If you’re curious about your app usage, take a look at your settings, under screen time. 

If you’re one to drag and drop items onto your main desktop screen and forget to organize them into folders or delete anything you no longer need, take some time to clean it up. The same goes for your phone or tablet screen that might be littered with apps. 

Sort through what’s there, delete anything you no longer need, and don’t forget to clear your downloads folder and trash or recycling bin!

Lastly, another form of digital clutter is any old electronics you’ve held onto just in case — and the accompanying cords for every single one of them. Take the time to decide what can be donated or recycled.

You can recycle electronics at your local electronics recycling center, and retailers, such as Best Buy, accept certain electronics for recycling. Additionally, you may be able to trade in eligible electronics through programs from retailers and manufacturers such as Apple, Best Buy, Costco, or even Amazon.

• Sign up for email updates.
• Visit the 2026 Decluttering Cure page and catch up on assignments.
• Download the Decluttering Cure calendar.
• Check off that you’ve completed this task and track your overall Decluttering Cure progress here!
• See all the winners from our 2026 Organization Awards to get your home organized. 

The Cure Program is a tradition here at Apartment Therapy — it happens every January, April, and September. Click here to learn more about the year-round program and when to sign up.