[Full Guide] How to Fix C Drive Getting Full Automatically on Windows 11

My C drive is full without reason on Windows 11

Why C drive gets full automatically on Windows 11?

The C drive is one of the main partitions on the PC, it usually stores the Windows OS, so the condition of the C drive would influence the PC performance. In the forums, some users said the C drive gets full automatically on Windows 11.  

By combining various related materials, here are the possible reasons:

➹ Attack of the viruses.
➹ Numerous hidden files are stored on your PC.
➹ The Windows system files are corrupted.
➹ Many junk files accumulated on the hard drive.
➹ The system restore points occupy much disk space.
➹ Excessive programs installed on the C drive.
➹ The remaining space of the C drive is small.

How to fix C drive becoming full issue on Windows 11

According to the reasons listed before, apart from removing viruses from the PC, you can try these experienced solutions to fix Windows 11 C drive getting full automatically problem.

▶ Method 1. Show and remove hidden files

There're some hidden files on the hard drive, when they have accumulated to a certain extent, you may waste much space. Here, you can find out and remove hidden files.

Step 1. Click "This PC", then find the "View" option and select "Options".

Step 2. In the "Folder Options", tick "Show hidden files, folders, and drives" and click "OK".

Step 3. Then you can find out and delete the hidden files in the File Explorer.

▶ Method 2. Check the system files

The system files are related to the operation of the Windows OS, if they’re corrupted, they may cause some errors on the hard disk.

Step 1. Click "Start" and type "cmd", then choose "Run as administrator".

Step 2. In the CMD window, type "sfc /scannow" and press "Enter" to scan and check the system files.

Step 3. Then you can repair the system files by inputting "Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth" and then press "Enter".

▶ Method 3. Disable the hibernation mode

If the hibernation is opened, when you leave the PC, Windows OS will automatically restore the current programs and files. However, this mode would spend much C drive space, so you can disable it to free up C drive space.

Step 1. Press "Windows" and then type "cmd" in the task bar, select "Run as administrator".

Step 2. Input "powercfg -h off" and press "Enter" to turn off the hibernation mode.

▶ Method 4. Run disk cleanup

When there's few free C drive space, you can run Disk Cleanup tool, cleaning up some of the junk files from the C drive.

Step 1. Right-click the target C drive and select "Properties", then click "Disk Cleanup".

Step 2. In the following interface, choose the junk files you want to delete, then click "OK".

▶ Method 5. Delete the system restore points

To maintain the stable operation of the PC, Windows will back up the system information on time. But these files may spend lots of time, so you can delete the system restore points. (Except the latest one. )

Step 1. Open "This PC", then right-click on the C drive and click "Properties".

Step 2. In the small window, click "Clean up system files".

Step 3. Select "More Options", then click "Clean up". A warning will pop out, read carefully and then click "Delete".

 ▶ Method 6. Uninstall some applications

When C drive getting full automatically on Windows 11, uninstall some unneeded applications is also a method worth trying.

Step 1. Press "Window+ R" to open the Run program, then type "control" and press "Enter".

Step 2. Click "Uninstall a Program" in the Control Panel.

Step 3. Right-click the unwanted applications and click "Uninstall".

 ▶ Method 7. Extend the C drive

Extending the C drive can also be a good idea to fix C drive becoming full issue. Here, you can try the powerful disk manager AOMEI Partition Assistant Professional. This tool can be used in Windows 11/10/8.1/8/7/Vista/XP.

With several simple steps, you can easily extend the target partition, even when there's no unallocated space on the hard disk. The "Allocated free space" function can move the free space of other drives, providing you with a much larger C drive space.

Step 1. Right-click the partition with enough free space, select "Allocate Free Space".

Step 2. Set the size of the allocated free space and the C drive, click "OK".

Step 3. Click "Apply" and "proceed" extend the target partition.

 ▶ Method 8. Move installed App to another drive

If you don't want to uninstall the programs from your PC, you can try to migrate it to another drive.

Step 1. In the top interface, click "Free up" and "App Mover".

Step 2. You have 2 options: "App Mover" and "Move Folders" in this function. Here we choose "App Mover".

Step 3. In the new window, choose the C drive and click "Next".

Step 4. Choose all unwanted applications and select a destination path, then click "Move".

Step 5.  Click "OK" to the applications to another drive.

Step 6. When the task is finished, click "Finish".

▶ Method 9. Upgrade the current disk to a larger one

When you have tried the mentioned methods, but with little success, replacing the current disk to a larger one is also a useful method.

Step 1. Connect the new hard drive with the PC, click "Clone" and "Clone Disk" in the top menu.

Step 2. There're two choices to clone the current disk: "Clone Disk Quickly" and "Sector-by-Sector Clone". Now, choose "Clone Disk Quickly". 

Step 3. In the new window, choose the current disk and click "Next".

Step 4. Then select the new hard drive and tick "Optimize the performance of SSD", then click "Next".

Step 5. In this window, you need to edit the disk, then click "Next".

Step 6. Click "Apply" and "Proceed" to upgrade the current disk. Since the Windows OS is stored on the Cd drive, you need to change boot drive after the disk cloning operation.

Note: If you want to fix C drive becoming full problem on Windows Server, you can turn to the Server Version.

To sum up

How to fix C drive getting full automatically issue on Windows 11? In this post, you can find out 9 solutions, including deleting hidden files, running Disk Cleanup, extending the C drive, etc. If you want to deeply free up the C drive and efficiently use the PC, you can try the AOMEI Partition Assistant.