My phone still shows low storage after using Cleanup: Phone Storage Cleaner, what’s going on?

If your phone still shows low storage after using Cleanup, it’s often because deleted photos and videos are moved to the Recently Deleted album, which continues to occupy space until permanently removed.

Open Photos, go to Recently Deleted, and delete everything there to actually free storage.

Another common reason is that Cleanup mainly removes duplicates or similar files, while large space users like apps, caches, system data, or iCloud content remain untouched.

Check Settings → General → iPhone Storage to see which category is still using space.

Storage readings can also lag, especially after large deletions, so restart your phone to force iOS to recalculate usage.

If space still doesn’t change, Cleanup likely removed files synced with iCloud rather than local copies, meaning your on-device storage was never reduced.