Cache Cleaner

Reclaim disk space on Windows in one click. A lightweight, themeable utility that clears temporary files and cache leftovers, and tells you exactly what it removed.

Table of Contents

• Why Cache Cleaner
• Download
• What It Cleans
• Run From Source
• Administrator Rights
• Build the EXE
• Project Structure
• Contributing
• License

Why Cache Cleaner

• One click. Press Clean now and you are done. No wizard, no account, no telemetry.
• Transparent results. After every run you see the space recovered, items removed, folders skipped and items that failed.
• You stay in control. Choose which locations to clean and which file types to delete.
• Safe by design. It only touches a short, documented list of temporary locations (see What It Cleans), and it never needs an internet connection.
• Responsive. Cleanup runs in a background thread, so the window never freezes.
• Pleasant to use. Seven built-in themes, from Eco Moss to Monochrome Fog.

Download

Grab the latest CacheCleaner.exe from the Releases page and run it. No installation or Python required.

Windows SmartScreen may warn about an unsigned executable. If you prefer, you can read the source and run it from source or build the EXE yourself.

What It Cleans

Location	Default	Notes
C:\Windows\Temp	On	Needs administrator rights
C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\Temp	On	Your user temp folder
C:\Windows\Prefetch	On	Needs administrator rights
C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\Download	Off	Windows Update download cache, needs administrator rights
Windows Recycle Bin	Off	Needs administrator rights

File type filters

In Settings → Cleanup you can delete every file type, or only selected groups:

Group	Extensions
Temporary	.tmp, .temp
Logs	.log, .etl
Crash dumps	.dmp, .mdmp
Cache leftovers	.cache, .bak, .old

Note: Files that are in use by Windows or other apps cannot be removed and are reported as skipped or failed. Deleted files do not go to the Recycle Bin, so review your Cleanup settings before running.

Run From Source

Requirements: Windows 10 or 11 and Python 3.10 or newer.

git clone https://github.com/Leo00703/CacheCleaner.git
cd CacheCleaner

python -m venv .venv
.\.venv\Scripts\activate
pip install -r requirements.txt

python run.py

You can also double-click start_cache_cleaner.bat, which launches the app without a console window when a virtual environment is present.

Administrator Rights

Some of the cleaned folders are protected by Windows.

• On a normal start the app asks for elevation once, so it can run with full cleanup capability.
• If you decline, or run without administrator rights, protected locations are skipped and shown as skipped in the results. Your user temp folder is still cleaned.

Build the EXE

pip install pyinstaller
pyinstaller --noconfirm --onefile --windowed --name CacheCleaner run.py

The executable is created in dist/.

Project Structure

CacheCleaner/
├── app/
│   ├── cleaner.py        # Cleanup engine: targets, filters, results
│   ├── elevation.py      # Administrator detection and elevated relaunch
│   ├── main.py           # Entry point, single-instance lock, worker thread
│   └── popup.py          # Tkinter user interface and themes
├── assets/               # Icon, logo and README cover image
├── run.py                # Launcher
├── start_cache_cleaner.bat
├── pyproject.toml
└── requirements.txt

Contributing

Bug reports, ideas and pull requests are welcome. Please read CONTRIBUTING.md first, and see SECURITY.md to report a vulnerability. Notable changes are listed in the changelog.

License

Released under the Apache License 2.0.