Spacebroom
Tidy up your Photos app: find duplicates, nearly identical pictures, screenshots and big videos, look through them and move them to the app’s own bin. Nothing is deleted until you have given it a final check.
It costs nothing: no subscription, no ads and no account. Your photos never leave your iPhone: Spacebroom analyzes them only on the device and has no server. For iPhone with iOS 26 or later, in English and German.
What the app can do
- Duplicates (photos and videos) and similar photos and videos, with a suggestion for which one to keep
- Sort through bursts: the picture you chose stays
- Blurry photos, screenshots, screen recordings and photos of documents (receipts, notes), only as suggestions for you to look at
- Big videos and largest items sorted by size, with filters for year, album and place
- Shrink: save videos, photos and Live Photos as a smaller copy
- Swipe: left to remove, right to keep, with no daily limit
- Bin with a final check, and the statistic “Deleted with Spacebroom”
How Spacebroom works
- You allow access to your photos (full access or only to selected photos).
- Spacebroom searches on your iPhone. With lots of photos this can take a while; you can keep using the app in the meantime.
- In each area you see what Spacebroom suggests. Only what is safe is preselected. You choose everything else yourself.
- “Move to Bin” only puts the photos into the Spacebroom bin. Nothing changes in Photos.
- In the bin you see everything once more. With “Delete in Photos” you delete it in Photos. It then stays in “Recently Deleted” there for 30 days, and you can recover it. Before that, your iPhone asks you once more.
Frequently asked questions
Does Spacebroom cost anything?
No. The app costs nothing, has no subscription and no ads. You don’t need an account.
Do my photos leave my iPhone?
No. Spacebroom has no server and doesn’t send any photos or data about you to the internet. Spacebroom doesn’t compare items that are stored only in iCloud, or compares them only roughly, and doesn’t shrink them. Just for viewing, your iPhone can download such a photo from Apple’s iCloud, depending on what you set in the app under “About Spacebroom” at “Load Photos from iCloud” (Automatic, Wi-Fi Only or Tap to Load). This happens between your iPhone and iCloud, not through us, and can use mobile data (this includes preloading the next two photos while you swipe). Read more in the privacy policy.
Why is a photo blurry or empty in the large view?
If you use “Optimize iPhone Storage”, your iPhone keeps only a small version of many photos. Spacebroom shows that version first and loads the sharp version from iCloud according to your setting: right away with “Automatically”, on its own only on Wi-Fi with “Wi-Fi Only”, and after you tap “Load from iCloud” with “Only on Tap”. While you swipe, the app fetches the next two photos in advance (with “Wi-Fi Only” only on Wi-Fi, not with “Only on Tap”, not in Low Data Mode). A video loads when you tap play, in lower quality on mobile data. You’ll find the setting under “About Spacebroom” at “Load Photos from iCloud”. Without a connection, the small view stays.
Do I get the space back right away when I delete?
Not necessarily. Deleted photos stay in the “Recently Deleted” album in Photos for another 30 days. If you want the space right away, empty that album. With iCloud Photos, deleted items are deleted on all your devices. If you use a Shared Library, deleting photos from it deletes them for everyone who shares it. If your iCloud storage is full, your iPhone deletes immediately and permanently.
How reliable are the suggestions?
Spacebroom never suggests favorites, and never a photo you marked with “Keep”. One version of each group always stays. Only items that look identical after a precise comparison count as “Exact Copy”. “Nearly the Same”, blurry photos, screenshots and documents are suggestions for you to look at and are never preselected.
What does Spacebroom not shrink?
Anything that would lose something: slo-mo videos, Cinematic mode videos and spatial videos, Portrait photos with depth, spatial photos, RAW photos, animated images (GIF), edited photos and burst photos. With “Smallest File”, HDR videos stay unchanged, because they would lose HDR. For Live Photos there is “Convert Live Photos”, which keeps only the photo. When shrinking, Spacebroom first saves a copy and checks it. Only then does the original go into the bin. If something goes wrong, the original stays unchanged.
What doesn’t work with limited access?
Spacebroom can only see albums with full access. With limited access, it therefore can’t check whether a copy is in one of your albums, and duplicates are then only suggestions for you to look at. When shrinking, the copy is then not added to any album. You can change access on your iPhone in Settings > Apps > Spacebroom > Photos.
I have an idea or found a bug
Great! In the app, tap “About Spacebroom” and then “Feedback & Ideas”. The app opens a ready-made email to kontakt@fairapps.at (older versions to fairapps@gmx.at, which still works), with the app version, iOS version and device type at the bottom. You see the email and send it yourself. You can also write directly to the address below.
Contact
Questions, bugs, ideas:
For bugs it helps to know your device, your iOS version and what you were just doing. Please only send screenshots if nothing personal is visible on them.