Buyer's guide
An honest look at the four worth knowing in 2026, what each is best at, and how to pick. Full disclosure: we make one of them, Delve. We'll tell you where the others beat it anyway.
If you're on Apple Silicon with macOS 26 and want free, Delve is our pick, and yes, we're biased, so read on for where it loses. If you want the most polished tool and don't mind paying, DaisyDisk ($9.99). If you're on an older or Intel Mac, or you want open source, GrandPerspective (free). If you just want the ten biggest files in a plain list, OmniDiskSweeper (free).
| Tool | Price | View | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Delve | Free | Treemap | Free + modern, Apple Silicon |
| DaisyDisk | $9.99 | Sunburst | Polish, Intel/old macOS, cloud accounts |
| GrandPerspective | Free (OSS) | Treemap | Open source, older/Intel Macs |
| OmniDiskSweeper | Free | List | Simplicity, older Macs |
Prices and details current as of June 2026. Tap any tool below for the full head-to-head.
Free, native, Apple Silicon. A cushioned treemap rendered on the GPU, fast scans via bulk metadata reads, and honest APFS accounting so the space it promises is the space you actually recover. Spotlight, Shortcuts, and Quick Look are built in, and deletion goes through the Trash. The catch, and we're not going to hide it: it needs macOS 26 and Apple Silicon, it isn't open source, and it doesn't scan cloud-storage accounts. If those rule you out, one of the others below is your tool. More about Delve →
The most polished option, and worth its $9.99. A lovely circular sunburst, fast scans, cloud-account scanning, and it runs on Intel Macs and macOS back to 10.13. The two things to know: file deletion is locked behind the purchase, and it reports a single size per file rather than breaking out on-disk versus logical. If you're not on recent Apple Silicon, this is the one to buy. Delve vs DaisyDisk →
The dependable free treemap, open source under the GPL, still shipping after all these years, and it runs on Macs that Delve won't launch on. The UI is utilitarian and it doesn't do APFS clone accounting or modern integration, but for a free, auditable tool on an older or Intel Mac, it's the right call. Delve vs GrandPerspective →
Not a treemap, a sorted list, largest to smallest, from the long-trusted Omni Group. Tiny, free, dead simple, and it runs on older macOS. If you don't need the picture and just want to find and delete the biggest files fast, its focus is a feature. Delve vs OmniDiskSweeper →
It mostly comes down to two questions. First, what Mac are you on? Older or Intel rules out Delve entirely, so it's GrandPerspective or OmniDiskSweeper for free, or DaisyDisk if you'll pay. Second, do you want a picture or a list? A treemap makes "what's biggest" obvious at a glance and is worth it for most people; a list is faster if you already know you're hunting a few large files. And if you're switching from Windows, the WinDirStat and WizTree notes cover the Mac equivalents.
On recent Apple Silicon, free and modern with numbers you can trust: Delve. We built it because nothing else was all three at once.
Everywhere else, the right answer is one of the others, and we've said which. That's the whole point of an honest roundup.
On Apple Silicon and macOS 26, Delve: a free, modern treemap with honest APFS accounting. On older or Intel Macs, GrandPerspective is the best free treemap that still runs; OmniDiskSweeper is the simplest free list.
DaisyDisk, $9.99 one-time. The most polished option, with a sunburst view, cloud-account scanning, and Intel and old-macOS support. Deletion is behind the purchase.
On the Mac the fast path is bulk metadata reads. Delve
uses getattrlistbulk and GPU rendering to
scan a 1 TB volume in under two minutes on a base M2.
WizTree's MFT trick is Windows-only and doesn't apply to
APFS.
APFS clones and hardlinks share storage and iCloud stubs are placeholders, so logical size often overstates what you'll recover. Tools that count on-disk size with inode dedup, like Delve, show the real number.