There might not be a more satisfying task than a really thorough Spring Cleaning—but a Winter Computer Declutter comes close! And, since there’s no danger of stepping on volleyball-sized dust bunnies or putting your hand into—ummm, something? —sticky while deep cleaning your computer, the winter clean may be your new favorite housekeeping task.

 

Five steps to get your computer clean, organized, and running faster than ever:

 

1. Uninstall apps.

If you haven’t used it in a few months, go to Settings/Apps/Apps & Features and delete it.

 

2. Tidy up your browser.

Go to Settings in your browser and use Clear browsing data and Manage Cookies to clear the cache of all coding and digital data collected from sites you visit. (Pro tip: Write down the usernames and passwords for sites you visit regularly since they’ll be wiped when you delete cookies.)

 

3. Clean up your folders.

Check your Downloads folder and copy anything you still need into a standard folder before deleting the rest. Do a spot check of your documents folder to delete duplicates, archive anything old but still important, and organize your folders for more efficient use. To really free up space, choose the Details view in each folder and organize by Size. Photos, videos, and random downloads can be huge files; if you don’t need them (or have copies elsewhere), delete them.

 

4. Organize your emails.

This may take some time but use this time to not just delete emails you don’t want but to make sure you don’t get messages from those senders again. We all enter our emails to receive newsletters (we read once) and discounts (we use once). If you’ve gotten what you need, open each email and click Unsubscribe and then delete the email. If you have old emails you really want to keep, create subfolders like “Photos,” or “Love Letters” or “Travel Plans.” And make sure to empty your trash can when you’re finished to free up more storage.

 

5. Use your tools!

Type “Disk Cleanup” in your Search window and run the built-in tool that removes temporary files, system logs, and other “behind the scenes” data you don’t need.

 

As always, any time you dedicate to good computing hygiene is a good time to reset your passwords. And, while you’re setting a monthly reminder to reset your passwords again, set another (quarterly—or more often if things get out of hand quickly for you!) to do another digital deep clean. Next stop? The Christmas Wrapping Paper Closet. You’re on your own for that one…