How to Permanently Delete Games on the PlayStation 4 (With Photos)

As much as video game fans would love unlimited storage on their favorite home console, that’s something we’re unlikely to see in the near future.

Instead, you have to carefully balance how many games you install at once so you have a few different titles available at the same time. Some games (looking at you, Red Dead Redemption 2) can take up more than 100GB of storage which means deleting games becomes a necessary step as you want to install new releases or even pick up an older game. 

Thankfully, Sony makes it easy to quickly delete games from the console and free up storage for new installs, plus find some additional storage by deleting older saved games.

Here are the quick and easy steps you can take right now to free up space for your next Call of Duty download. 

Deleting a Game from System Storage

When you really want to clear out a bunch of space on your PlayStation 4, deleting games directly from system storage is the way to go. You can even view everything you have installed on your console by size which makes it easy to determine which games are taking up the most space. 

Follow these easy steps:

1. On the home screen of your PS4 console, navigate over to the Settings icon. It should be in the top row all the way to the right next to the Power button. 
2. When the Settings menu opens, scroll down until you find Storage. It should be sandwiched between Devices and Themes. 
3. Depending on your console and what you have added after your original purchase, you likely will just see an option for System Storage. However, if you have added an additional hard drive for more storage space, you will also see an option for Extended Storage. Hit the X button to see what is taking up your storage and the same steps apply to both internal and external storage. 
4. Once you are in System Storage, scroll down to the first option which should be Applications, and hit X on your controller to enter and see what applications are installed. 
5. On your controller (DualSense or third party), press the Options button so you can see a popup menu appear from the right-hand side of your screen. In this step, you can choose to delete only one game at a time.  
6. However, you can also choose to delete as many games as you want by choosing Select All and then selecting the boxes next to each game or application and marking it for deletion. 
7. When you are ready, click on the Delete option at the bottom right of your screen. You’ll be asked to confirm your selections, so hit OK and that’s it, the games are deleted!

With these helpful steps, you’re now able to delete games permanently from your PS4. Whether you’re trying to conserve space on your device or if you no longer need a certain game, you can perform this vital function. However, if you still have any lingering questions or curiosities, we found a great video tutorial you can watch on YouTube.

Deleting a Game from the PS4 Home Screen

Deleting from System Storage is the primary way to delete games, but you can just as easily delete PS4 games from the console system library as well. 

Follow these simple steps:

Delete Saved Game Data from Your PS4

Permanently deleting saved games from the PS4 is easy using either of the two steps above. However, deleting the games is only half the battle. To truly free up space, you also need to delete each game’s saved data from your PS4 console as well. 

1. Similar to the first method of deleting games, to delete saved game data, you’ll go to the Settings menu on the console. 
2. As soon as you are in the Settings menu, look for Application Saved Data Management and click on Saved Data in System Storage. 
3. Look for Delete in the window that pops up following the last step and select it so you can choose which games from which you want to delete saved data. It’s important that you don’t delete the data from any game which is currently still installed, otherwise you could lose all of your progress. 
4. Once you choose the games you want to delete, hit the Options button on the controller and you can delete just one game or select multiple saved game files. 
5. Hit the Delete button in the bottom right corner and then hit OK again when the following window pops up to confirm your selection. 

All of the selected game data you chose to delete should now be removed from the console and additional space should be freed up. 

Deleting Game Capture Data from Your PS4

The last and final step to removing any hint that a deleted game still exists on your console, you can delete any screenshots that may have been captured during gameplay. While not likely to free up a significant amount of free space, it’s still a good idea to remove this content. 

1. To remove game capture data, open up the Capture Gallery that should live on the main home screen. 
2. You’re looking for the All folder, which should be in the very top left-hand corner of the screen as soon as you enter the Capture Gallery. As soon as you locate All, hit the Options button on your controller.  
3. Similar to the steps above, once you’ve identified the items you want to delete inside the All folder, hit the Options button again. 
4. When the right-hand side menu pops up, select Delete and choose Select All, and then hit Delete. 
5. As soon as the popup appears to confirm you want to delete, select OK, and voila, no more saved game capture data. 

Wrapping Up

Deleting games, applications, and saved data files can all help free up space on your console for new games or applications.

Even if you want to believe the PlayStation 4’s 1TB hard drive is big enough for multiple games, as the games themselves get bigger, you need to be more cognizant of free space. The last thing you want is to be unable to install a game because you don’t have any room.

The image featured at the top of this post is ©iStock.com/happylemon.