New Year New You: 5 ways to clean up your digital life

Wouldn't it be great if everything was just a little bit simpler? Wouldn’t it be amazing if we could find an easier way to live more healthily, reduce the clutter in our lives, or feel more organised? A quest for simplicity is, after all, what a lot of New Year's resolutions boil down to.

Well, we can’t help you when it comes to your work, home or health resolutions, but we can help you simplify your digital life. All that online and on screen activity attracts mess, clutter and bad habits just like the others. Here are five easy ways to clean and declutter your digital existence.

1. Ditch the clutter

We subscribe to digital newsletters and emails for all sorts of reasons - and at the drop of a hat. Maybe the content was useful at that moment, or maybe we wanted to take advantage of a subscriber offer. The problem is, many of us never unsubscribe, and so the subscriptions just pile up year on year, clogging our inboxes and slowing the time it takes to get to the stuff we really need.

Now’s the time to unsubscribe to everything you don’t regularly open. Be ruthless. You can always sign up again in six months if you need it then, but for now, ditch anything that isn’t of current interest and value.

In a similar vein, computer desktops can also become clogged with random folders and files from who knows when. It’s just another impediment to clarity of thought and speed of action. Drag and delete everything you don’t need or regularly use.

2. Say adios to unused apps

Look deep into almost any device and you’ll find a graveyard of unused apps. You know, that takeaway food app you tried once and hated. That weather app that you thought would be better than the other one but wasn’t. That productivity app that was so fussy it stopped you being productive.

If you’re anything like us, you probably cling onto a load of unused apps either because you forget about them or “just in case”. If so, it’s time to get rid. They’re taking up room and memory and making it more difficult to find the apps you really do need. They could also be slowing your device down.

3. Delete your downloads

Something else that could be slowing your system down a bit is all the ancient files in your laptop's downloads folder. It’s easy for downloads to get out of hand, and images and video might be taking up a large chunk of precious hard drive space. Delete anything you don’t want or need and, again, be merciless; if it doesn’t serve a purpose now, show it the door.

4. Quiet intrusive notifications

The constant beep, buzz and flash of notifications can take us out of the moment, making deep focus and concentration impossible. There are very few things that need to be attended to immediately, so turn off notifications for everything but the most essential apps or services.

That certainly means nixing social media notifications, and also those from non-essential email accounts and trivial applications. And do you really need to know right this second every time your banking app pays a standing order?

Disabling and muting will give you headspace for the things that really are important and, as an added bonus, slow the drain on your device battery.

In fact, why not go a step further and disable background refresh and location based services too, at least for apps that don’t absolutely need them on? This often unnecessary background activity can make devices sluggish and drain battery life.

5. Upgrade everything

It’s worth checking you’re running the latest version of your operating system, internet browser and security software. In fact, it’s worth making sure you’re running the latest version - or at least the latest version your device can handle - of all the software you use.

Some of these updates may happen automatically, such as the updates to operating systems you sometimes have to accept or schedule. Make sure you accept these updates and don’t endlessly click the “do it later” button.

Staying on top of updates is the best way to strengthen your device’s defences against cyber attack and keep your data and personal information safe. Updates may also contain performance improvements and new features, so applying them promptly is a good way to make sure your systems are running as efficiently as possible.

There are plenty of other ways to clean up your digital life, the most important of which might be to spend a bit less time living digitally and a bit more living in the real world. But applying these five steps will go a long way to making your digital world simpler and more satisfying in 2025, freeing up time for more of the things you really like doing.