CCleaner (aka Crap Cleaner, not even joking look it up on wikipedia) where Crap is the adjective describing it's horrible Windowsesque interface and the app itself.
I have been using CCleaner, of course and other disk cleaning apps, for 2 years, CCleaner is working well on macOS Catalina, however, I think the interface should be improved.
This is not a review per se, it is a discussion of the class of software to which this program belongs. As a public service to the MacUpdate community, I've found as many of these "cleaner" apps on this website as I could and listed them them below. (I did a search for 'cleaner'.) If MacUpdate will let me, I intend to post this every time a new or updated version of one of these things shows up on this site. There are 42 in the list, and it seems like new entries in the 'Mac cleaner' market space pop up every day, metastasizing like a cancer. Unfortunately, more is not better. They are all of dubious value. Many have no reviews at all. Many have what look to be essentially fake 5-star reviews with no useful commentary. Many -- probably the most accurate and honest -- have negative reviews, by users who have been burned by them. Most of the developers' descriptions boast about what a great job they do, but the truth is, there are no good, comprehensive, head-to-head reviews of these programs by impartial 3rd parties. True experts in macOS maintenance advise against using any of them, because in general they serve little useful purpose and they can easily do more harm than good. Macs simply do not need "cleaning." (See for example: https://www.thesafemac.com/the-myth-of-the-dirty-mac/) Some of these programs are notorious for being little more than malware. The user is well-advised to read any program documentation and make a RELIABLE BACKUP before attempting any changes. If I have missed any programs that should be on the list, please leave a comment and let me know. I will rate all these programs with one star, probably one more than they deserve. And I would appreciate comments. If you disagree, please speak up. But if all you can come up with is 5 stars and a sentence or two saying that program X is great and I don't know what I'm talking about, please save your breath. No one here will take you seriously. And I apologize for the almost unreadable formatting, a severe limitation of MacUpdate itself, which compresses maximum text into minimum space, leaving no whitespace for readability. :: BEGIN LIST: : Aooro : AppCleaner & Uninstaller : AutoTrash : AweCleaner : CCleaner : CleanGeeker : Clean Me : Cleaner One Pro : CleanMyMac X : Cocktail : Combo Cleaner : Disk Aid : Disk Cleaner : Disk Cleaner Pro : Disk Expert : Disk Health : DiskKeeper Advanced Cleaner : DiskKeeper Cleaner - Modern : DiskKeeper Pro : Disk Xray : Doctor Disk Cleaner : HD Cleaner : iMac Cleaner : MacBooster : Mac Cleaner : MacClean : MacClean360 : MacCleaner Pro : MacCleanse : MacEnizer : MacMaintenance : MacMaster : Mojave Cleaner : PowerMyMac : Pro Disk Cleaner : Quick Cleaner : Sensei : Stellar SpeedUpMac : TrashMe 3 : Washing Machine : WeCleanse : Wise Mac Care :: END LIST : :: The only system maintenance tools I recommend are 1) TinkerTool System, a true bargain priced at only $14 for a single license. TinkerTool System is a an exceptional piece of quality engineering, safe when used properly, and superbly documented, with in-depth tutorials for every option. 2) OnyX, from Titanium Software, another excellent developer. 3) I have used Northern Softworks' "Cache Cleaners" in the past (the latest being "Catalina Cache Cleaner," which I have not used) and their products are first rate. As for the rest, listed above, it is safe to say that nobody who really knows what they're doing with Macs and macOS will touch them. Don't get sucked in by a pretty interface. You may very well regret it. -SB
Decent. Simple and effective. Some functions are better than others, but for the most part the app does what is says. Works OK under Cataline, I have not experienced any problems. Would I recommend it. It's a tough one. Still, I think I would. It is cheaper than CleanMyMac. (Onyx is free and does much of what CCleaner Pro does, yet I prefer the latter.) Thank you.
I have used CCleaner for years and loved it. Something went haywire with Mac Catalina OS- CCleaner hangs and has to be manually killed. Messy and awkward. Somebody tell me, whatever the trouble was with Catalina, that it has been fixed. I am not comfortable browsing without confidence that I can clean up all the C... that gets left behind. Please.
Release notes ARE available, and system requirements mention "an Apple Mac running 64-bit macOS 10.8 to 10.14 Mojave"
https://www.ccleaner.com/ccleaner-mac/version-history
CCleaner is one of the best apps to clean Mac which scans your computer to remove all types of files which are responsible to slow your Mac effectively. The tool helps you get rid of broken system permissions, temporary files, junk files, and other issues. Get CCleaner for Mac from here. https://bit.ly/2oHqKvD
Here are the changes:
"v1.17.603 (22 Aug 2019)
*NEW* Large File Finder
- A new feature to scan for files above a specified size. These can then be selected and securely deleted
macOS
- Added cleaning support for MacOS Catalina Beta
Browser Cleaning
- Firefox: Improved Cookies and Site Data cleaning
- Safari: Improved Last Session cleaning
Bug Fixes
- Fixed a bug which caused a blank amount of cleaned data in some Smart Cleaning popups
- Fixed a bug which caused some users to be navigated to the wrong page when opening CCleaner from the status bar
- Fixed a bug which prevented CCleaner from automatically reopening after updating
Translations
- Improved translations for: German, Spanish, Dutch, Czech, French, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese & Russian
- Added translations for various dialog boxes"
I don't know what happened to this app in the most recent versions. I upgraded from 10.10 to 10.13 and all it does hang at various parts of the scanning process. It ran fine on 10.10. I keep installing the latest version hoping they fixed this, but it useless now.
And the Windows version disabled the Windows Defender and sideloads Chrome. That's 2 strikes.
I'm not giving them a chance for a 3rd.
Installed on High Sierra in an external APFS SSD, speed is the same as the old version which is 1.10.335 with Mountain Lion in the internal HFS+ HDD.
Sadly that there is no alternative that can auto clean when the browser is quit.
I downloaded the _free_ version of CCleaner last year, and have just received an email from the developer saying the licence I "purchased" last year is due to expire and inviting me to renew my licence for UK£19.95 so that I can keep using the product for another year. Pretty shady conduct.
Running really slowly on High Sierra when cleaning. Disappointing, considering that I am a subscriber to the Windows "Pro" edition, which is being updated regularly.
Piriform seems not to be actively developing CCleaner for Mac. Last update was more than year ago and the clean operation become quite slow in macOS High Sierra, especially regarding Safari caches. The expensive "Pro" version offers just minor improvements over the free one, the tool to fix disk permissions was removed and uninstall tool does not work properly anymore.
If Piriform offers a more affordable "Pro" version and ensure the app keeps being updated, it could be a great alternative to paid cleaner utilities. Unhappily at this moment CCleaner is not a serious option for users of macOS High Sierra.
A month ago I reported that none of the logs in /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports are being removed, and none of the files in /Library/Logs/CrashReporter are either. So I MANUALLY removed 321 diagnostic reports and a bunch of CrashReporter files. That’s almost 100 MB I got back (already back to nearly 50 MB in three days).
After several emails with the dev. in which they failed to comprehend what I was saying, today I’m told to use Terminal to run CCleaner as sudo to clean the files that their app leaves behind.
"you can manually include these folders in CCleaner - then run CCleaner as sudo so that it will have the necessary permissions for the deletion of its files. To run CCleaner as sudo, simply open the terminal and type: sudo "/Applications/CCleaner.app/Contents/MacOS/CCleaner"
Even the description above is poorly worded - "It removes unused files from your system.” I don’t want it to remove “unused” files from my system - I want it to remove unnecessary and unwanted files from my system. I have thousand of “unused" files, even thousands of iTunes tracks I’ve never listened to or haven’t for a long time. According to the description CCleaner is going to get rid of them too (it doesn’t).
And the change log above doesn’t indicate that Repair Permissions has been fixed - it didn’t work at all in the previous v1.10. Maybe it was repaired under “minor stability and bug fixes,” who knows?
And it STILL removes Safari favicons even though I told the dev. I DO NOT want them cleaned. Those are “wanted” files so STOP cleaning them! Last time I ran it I unchecked the only Safari option that might cause this (Caches) but they still disappeared.
DARN GOOD THING IT’S FREE! Well, not when you consider all the time I’ve spent emailing Piriform and leaving reviews here.
Version 1.10 contained multiple bugs and was pulled, so v1.09 is now current.
These were glaringly obvious bugs that should have been caught if the product had been tested at all - it couldn't even repair permissions without hanging.
Frankly, I don't know why an app that calls itself the "number-one tool for cleaning your Mac" needs a permissions repair function, but whatever. Repairing and cleaning are two different things. There's no automated option to run the cleaner and then repair permissions, they must be done separately.
NOTE that this is the free version and a premium version is available for $24.99 that offers real-time monitoring, automatic updates and premium support.
CCleaner displays file sizes in KB instead of MB, so you end up with a list of files with sizes like 11,572 KB and 369,405 KB.
There's no way to exclude favicons, so when cleaning Internet files it will remove all your site icons from bookmarks and history, even if you tell it not to clean those two areas. I find this frustrating as the icons help to quickly identify websites.
I've used v1.10 a few times and don't like the GUI because when you click any item in the cleaning list it doesn't provide any information about what will be cleaned.
I used to use MacCleanse but it also contained critical bugs, plus it's from that horrible company Koingo.
I'm going to give Cocktail another try.
CCleaner is easy to use optimization utility for your Mac. It cleans traces of users online activity with several clicks. It helps to regain hard disk space. Good choice for everyone
I have been using Onyx for years and lately it has been hanging on OS10.9. I tried a few things including reinstalling with the same result, so I looked around for a replacement. Each one was trialled in turn and finally CCleaner. It was way smaller than the other programmes, it was way cheaper [free] than some and it cleaned up the permissions that others had missed. It has all the functionality of the expensive programmes, has a neat UI and does a better job. I'm impressed.
This is a must-have app for Windows/Mac users. It not only does its job but does it does it neatly. A gratis application to have attained an iconic status is really great. People who are used to both the Windows and Mac environment will find CCleaner to be a great boon.
I am really surprised at people who trash applications with trying to get in touch with the developers.
This application installs without asking a permanent item in the OS X menu bar that is not listed in the Login Items and cannot be disabled in the application preferences. I don't like this kind of intrusive behavior. It makes CCleaner a half star application for me.
I've used and recommended CCleaner on Windows since it was first released. I was excited to see that it is now available for Mac. Unfortunately, the Mac version is very, very slow and makes my MacBook Pro run as hot as an oven.
I have used this from day 1 with no problems whatsoever; the negative reviews have not informed me of any deletion of preferences in their reviews. What I did to update from my previous version was simply have the finder update to the most current for a Mac; the icons changed from the previous to the most recent.
The application bounces twice in the dock and starts right up with no delay. This is a needed program for complete deletion of internet cookies, cache, history, and temposry files; in a word this program RULES!!!
First, it's free, so can't complain about the price. It's very easy to use with intuitive interface and lots of options (like secure clean versus just normal delete of files). The only minor complaint is when doing a secure delete (and I'm only talking 1-pass, not 7), it took a very long time to complete and it was only erasing 1.2GB of files. Other than that, it seems like a great product. I especially like that I was able to select unneeded language files and delete them from the system (saved about 50MB of space)
The previous versions up to 1.03 ran pretty smooth but versions 1.04,1.05 are somewhat disappointing. The start-up is pretty slow taking anywhere from 3 - 5 minutes.
I am a long time user of Onyx and CCleaner compliments it nicely. It is easier to use than Onyx and focuses on more user orientated tasks vs Onyx's system focus. I have not had any problems with CCleaner on OS X or XP, though as with any utility you should carefully check the settings before running it.
This version doesn't start on either of my macs. Previous version is great! I used it all the time on Windows and look forward to it's continued development on the Mac platform.
This is an indispensable utility on Windows. Unfortunately, Windows is where this utility should stay.
This latest version launches extremely slowly on Snow Leopard and remains unresponsive long enough that I just force-quit it and deleted it.
Stick to Windows software folks.
Love this! Great stuff. App Store hasn't got the update yet. I tried downloading from both MacUpdate and developers website ... nothing happens.... broken links??
I've been using CCleaner on PCs for so many years I've forgotten how long. Great to see it come over to the True Believers' platform.
Appears to work just fine on my MacBook Pro with 10.7.3 and now 10.7.4. Cleans out a pile of old junk that just takes up drive space.
Doesn't have all of the same functionality as the PC version (e.g. tuning up directories, etc.), but doesn't need it. For what it does, this is, as it has always been on PCs, a quietly useful piece of software at a very reasonable cost.
My only gripe is not with the software, but with the App Store. This update has been showing on MacUpdate for days. Still no sign of the update on App Store. Just a wee bit quicker, Apple? Please?
Working great for me, load time seems a tad slow until the window appears. But the cleaning part is fast enough. Best feature that it has is the one I could never replicate with another program; the ability to whitelist some cookies and clean the rest.
For those that used CCleaner on Windows you'll find the familiar interface and settings that apply to that Mac, obviously some items are not needed from the Windows version. Price is right and for an early version it's feature set is solid, though I can seem room for growth too.
I was wondering if I was the only having problems running CCleaner. I downloaded the most recent version 1.01.101 and I'm running OS X 10.6.8. When I launch CCleaner the icon bounces in the dock for 15-20 seconds and that's it, nothing more happens. I don't get a window or a menubar and I have to force-quit it. I tried forcing the application in 32 bits mode but I got the exact same behavior. Any pointer would be appreciated.
P.S. I have been using CCleaner in my "ancient" XP partition for years and I really like it.
