Mac Tip: Remove Unused Footage From iMovie

This Mac tip is provided by Mark Greentree and was originally posted on Mark’s blog – Everyday Mac Support. For more of Mark’s tips visit his site, follow him on Twitter, or browse his archive of posts here.


How to: Remove Unused Footage From iMovie

As you may be aware iMovie files can be extremely large and will consume a significant amount of space on your hard drive.

In order to free up your hard drive, select the event you wish to delete by right clicking and selecting Move Event to Trash.

Upon selecting Move Event to Trash you will be presented with the following window:

The button you want to press in this example is Delete Unused.

This will then delete any content that has not been included in any projects. Depending on the size of the event this process may take a few minutes.

Below is a before and after comparison, showcasing the content available, used, and then deleted.

You will see used content with the orange bar. Unused will be clear.
You will notice there are no clear areas and only the footage used remains.

You can also do this in bulk by simply selecting more than one event and following the same process. It will take longer but it is less tedious than selecting them one by one.

Mark Greentree

Mark Greentree is the principle blogger and podcast creator of Everyday Mac Support. His aim is to inform users at all levels of experience how to get the most out of the Apple hardware and associated software. He is the lead host of Not Another Mac Podcast, an Apple based round table discussion with Mac users and experts from all over world.