FAQ and troubleshooting

That warning appears for any program that isn't code-signed yet, and Heft's downloads aren't signed yet. Click More info, then Run anyway.

If Smart App Control is on, Windows blocks unsigned programs without offering that choice. Releases will be signed once SignPath Foundation approves the project for free open-source code signing.

You can check that a download really was built from Heft's source on GitHub: each release has a SHA256SUMS.txt, and GitHub keeps a signed build record. With the GitHub CLI:

gh attestation verify heft-<version>-windows-x86_64.zip --repo gjnail/heft

The Mac download isn't signed or notarized, which needs a paid Apple developer account. Open System Settings > Privacy & Security, scroll down, and click Open Anyway. You only need to do this once.

No. Heft is a single program with no installer. Unzip it and run it. On Linux, bash scripts/install-linux.sh from the download adds it to your app launcher, without needing root.

You don't have to. Everything works without it, and Heft only asks. Administrator rights let Heft:

• use the fast scan, which reads the NTFS master file table in seconds;
• see folders a normal program can't open, such as System Volume Information;
• clean system-wide locations such as Windows Update downloads and memory dumps;
• change startup entries for all users, scheduled tasks and registry entries under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE;
• read CPU temperatures and motherboard sensors through PawnIO.

Heft never needs to run as administrator on a Mac. It asks for your password only when you do something that changes files outside your home folder, and then only once for everything you chose:

• cleaning system logs or the DNS cache on the Cleaner page;
• turning launch daemons on or off, or removing launch agents and daemons installed for all users, on the Login items page;
• uninstalling an app installed for all users, or moving leftovers that belong to the system, on the Apps page;
• fixing or restoring broken items outside your home folder.

The prompt comes from macOS itself; Heft never sees your password. The Hardware page reads every sensor without it.

Usually because Heft counts more carefully:

• Hard links are counted once. Windows keeps many system files under two names; tools that count both can over-count by tens of gigabytes.
• Online-only cloud files count as 0 bytes on disk, because they aren't on the disk.
• Size and space on disk differ for compressed and sparse files. Switch with View > Size rectangles by.
• A folder scan can't open everything. Without administrator rights, system folders and other users' folders are unreadable, so the total is lower than the drive's used space. Use the fast scan to see it all.

No. Online-only files are never opened or read, by the scan, the duplicate finder or anything else. Moving a folder that contains them is refused for the same reason.

On Windows, run Heft as administrator and leave Fast scan ticked; on an NTFS drive that's usually a few seconds even for millions of files. After that, Rescan only reads what changed. Network drives and drives that aren't NTFS always use the slower folder scan.

On a Mac, the first scan lists every folder, but after that Rescan only lists the folders macOS has logged changes in, on any local disk and without special permission. View > Update automatically keeps the map current. Network shares always get a full scan.

macOS protects folders such as Mail and the Trash. Give Heft Full Disk Access in System Settings > Privacy & Security to include them. The Cleaner needs it too, to see inside the Trash, Safari's cache and Recent items, and to list Safari's cookies, history and last session and new Teams' cache.

Heft is built to make that hard:

• Files go to the Recycle Bin or Trash, and the Removed tab can put them back.
• System files, programs, app data and other risky locations are marked, and explained before you can delete them. Anything that could stop the computer from starting needs an extra confirmation.
• Suggestions leave out anything risky, and only pre-select clearly disposable files.
• The Cleaner only touches a fixed list of known cache locations, and shows the exact files first.
• Every registry change on Windows, and every change to launch agents, login items and other entries on a Mac, is backed up first.

If you ever think Heft could delete the wrong files, please report it privately as described in the project's security policy.

Yes, as long as the Recycle Bin or Trash hasn't been emptied. Open the Removed tab, select the items and press Put back. On a Mac, items removed with an earlier version of Heft have to be put back from Finder: press Open the Trash, right-click an item and choose Put Back. Files removed by the Cleaner are caches and are deleted directly, so they can't be restored, but the programs that use them recreate them.

Open the Registry page and find the backup in the Backups list at the bottom, then press Restore. The backups are ordinary .reg files in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Heft\backups, so you can also double-click one to merge it back in.

If you only turned an item off, tick it again. Anything Heft removed or fixed was backed up first: open the Broken items page, find the backup in the Backups list at the bottom, and press Restore…. The backups are in ~/Library/Application Support/Heft/backups. Launch agents and daemons load again the next time you sign in or restart. See Backups.

No. No registry cleaner will, whatever it claims. Heft's Registry page is housekeeping: it removes entries that point to things that no longer exist, such as uninstall entries for programs that are gone. That tidies Apps & Features and the startup list, nothing more. The same goes for the Broken items page on a Mac: it stops macOS trying to start programs that are gone, and tidies up after deleted apps.

Only if you tick a browser's Cookies item. Cookies, history, form history and last sessions are never ticked by default, and each says what you'd lose.

Windows only lets a kernel driver read the CPU's temperature. Install PawnIO (winget install namazso.PawnIO), then use Restart as administrator on the Hardware page. See the Hardware guide.

Heft reads the Nuvoton sensor chips (NCT679x and NCT6701D) found on most ASUS and ASRock boards, through PawnIO. Gigabyte boards (ITE chips) and MSI boards with the NCT6687D aren't supported yet. On Linux, fans appear when your kernel has a driver for the chip; check sensors from lm-sensors. On a Mac, fans are read without a driver, and a Mac without a fan, such as a MacBook Air, has none to show.

No. On a Mac, Heft reads everything without an administrator password or a driver: CPU and GPU temperature, load and clock speed per core (performance and efficiency cores on Apple silicon), power for the CPU, GPU, Neural Engine and memory, fan speeds and whole-system power, drive temperature, wear and throughput, network speed, and the battery's charge, wear, cycle count and charge rate.

It has been tested on Apple silicon. Intel Macs haven't been tried yet, so reports are welcome. See What Heft can read.

No. Heft has no accounts, analytics or crash reporting. The only time it uses the network is when you check for or install software updates: on the Programs page on Windows, which runs winget, or on the Apps page on a Mac, which runs Homebrew and, if it's installed, mas for App Store apps. On a Mac you can also let Heft ask the update servers of apps that update themselves (Settings › Checking for updates); that's off unless you turn it on. This website has no analytics or cookies either.

• Scan snapshots for the Changes tab, the list of items it moved to the Recycle Bin or Trash, and your Cleaner selection, in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Heft (Windows), ~/Library/Application Support/Heft (macOS) or ~/.local/share/heft (Linux).
• Registry backups in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Heft\backups (Windows).
• Backups of the launch agents, login items and other entries Heft changed, in ~/Library/Application Support/Heft/backups, and the login items you turned off, in login-items-off.plist in the folder above it (macOS).
• The window size and a few view settings, in %APPDATA%\heft (Windows), ~/Library/Application Support/heft (macOS) or ~/.local/share/heft (Linux).

Snapshots record folder sizes and the names of files over 16 MB, not file contents.

Start with Windows adds a Heft value under HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run, and weekly cleaning adds a scheduled task called Heft\Weekly clean. On a Mac, Start at login adds ~/Library/LaunchAgents/io.github.gjnail.heft.plist, and weekly cleaning adds io.github.gjnail.heft.weekly-clean.plist next to it; macOS shows a "Background Items Added" notice for each. Turning any of them off removes it.

If you turned on Start with Windows or Start at login (View menu) or weekly cleaning (Cleaner page), turn them off first. On a Mac, that removes their launch agents. Then delete the program and its data folders:

• Windows: heft.exe, %LOCALAPPDATA%\Heft and %APPDATA%\heft. Keep a copy of %LOCALAPPDATA%\Heft\backups if you might want to undo a registry fix later.
• macOS: move Heft to the Trash and delete ~/Library/Application Support/Heft. Keep a copy of its backups folder if you might want to undo a change to a launch agent, login item or other entry later.
• Linux: delete the heft program and ~/.local/share/heft. If you used install-linux.sh, the top of that script lists the files it added.

Yes, and open source under the MIT license, with no paid version, ads or nagging. If it saved you some space and you'd like to say thanks, you can buy the author a coffee on Ko-fi.

Open an issue on GitHub. Reports from Macs and Linux are especially welcome: the Mac build has been tested on an Apple silicon Mac but not yet on Intel Macs, and the Linux build hasn't been tried on real hardware yet. Pull requests are welcome too; see the contributing guide.