My iPhone storage is almost full, and I realized my videos are taking up most of the space. I’m trying to find the biggest video files first so I can delete or move them, but I can’t find a way to sort videos by size in Photos or Files. Is there a built-in option or an easy workaround to sort iPhone videos by file size?
I ran into the same wall. iOS 26 still does not give you a clean way to sort videos by file size inside Photos, which feels dumb for a phone that records giant 4K clips all day.
The short version, no, there is no built-in “sort by size” button in the Photos app.
If your library is small, you can brute-force it. I did this once and hated every minute. Open a video, swipe up, or tap the little info icon. The file size shows there. Fine for 8 videos. Bad for 800.
Sorting by duration is the usual workaround, but it falls apart fast. A short 4K/60 clip often eats more space than a much longer 1080p video. So if your goal is storage cleanup, duration only gets you part of the way.
Here’s what I found, starting with the least annoying route.
1. Use a cleanup app that lists large videos properly
I used to avoid these because a lot of them feel shady or hide the useful part behind a paywall. Still, for this one job, native iPhone tools are clumsy enough that I gave in.
Clever Cleaner did the job better than anything else I tried. After you let it scan your library, there’s a section called Heavies. It lays out your videos from biggest to smallest and shows the exact size in MB or GB. No tapping into each clip. No weird shortcut setup. You scroll, pick the storage hogs, and send them to trash.
I also noticed it has a Compress tool. If you don’t want to wipe out old clips, this is the safer route. The reduced files still looked fine on my phone screen.
2. Look in iPhone Storage
If you don’t want any third-party app on your phone, check Settings, General, iPhone Storage. Sometimes iOS shows a “Review Large Videos” suggestion. When it appears, it helps. When it doesn’t, you’re back to digging around by hand. So, useful, but inconsistent.
3. Build a Shortcut
This one is more for people who don’t mind messing with automation. In Shortcuts, you can make a flow with “Find Photos,” filter for videos, then add a duration rule like “greater than 5 minutes.” After that, sort by duration, longest first.
It is not size sorting. Still, it gives you a rough hit list. I’d use it when you want a no-download workaround and you already know longer clips are likely part of the problem.
4. Check the Files app for downloaded videos
This only helps with videos stored in Files, like stuff in “On My iPhone” or iCloud Drive. Tap the three dots inside a folder and sort by size. Works fine there.
What it does not do is show your normal camera roll videos from Photos. You could move things over, sort them, clean up, then move them back, but I tried a similar process once and it felt like making a mess to clean a mess.
5. Check each video manually in Photos
Technically this works. Open clip, swipe up, read size, repeat until your patience leaves your body. I’d only do this if you have a tiny library or you already know which few clips are suspects.
For me, the fastest path was Clever Cleaner and its Heavies section. It solved the exact problem with the least fiddling.
One last thing. When you delete videos, they still sit in Recently Deleted for 30 days. I forgot this the first time and wondered why my storage number barely moved. If you want the space back right away, empty Recently Deleted too.
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No clean way exists in Photos to sort your camera roll videos by file size. Apple still skips this, which is annoyng.
One workaround I like more than the manual Info-screen method @mikeappsreviewer mentioned is using a Mac. Plug your iPhone into Photos or Image Capture on macOS. Image Capture often shows file sizes in a simple list before import. You can spot the 2 GB and 5 GB monsters fast, then delete them from the phone after you confirm what they are. It is clunky, but faster for big libraries.
Another solid route is iCloud.com on a desktop browser. If your Photos sync to iCloud, download candidates in batches to inspect sizes on your computer. Not perfect, but better than tapping every clip one by one.
If you want the fastest iPhone-only option, Clever Cleaner is one of the few apps built for this. It helps surface large videos and compress old ones if you want space back without deleting everything. This write-up on Clever Cleaner video compression and swipe cleanup features gives a decent overview.
One more tip. Settings, Camera, Record Video. Lowering future capture from 4K/60 to 1080p saves a ton of storage. A minute of 4K video often uses several times more space than lower settings, so cleanup helps now, and this stops the same problm next week.
Honestly, I’d push back a little on the “use duration as a proxy” idea from @mikeappsreviewer. It’s better than nothing, but it can be wildly off if you’ve got mixed formats, slo-mo, HDR, or 4K clips. A 40-second video can be a storage nuke.
What worked better for me was this:
- Go to Settings > General > iPhone Storage
- Wait for storage categories to finish loading
- Tap Photos
- See whether iOS offers recommendations tied to large attachments or media cleanup
It’s not true sorting, yeah, but sometimes iOS surfaces problem areas without digging through the whole library. Kinda hidden, kinda half-baked, very Apple.
If you want a cleaner iPhone-only method, Clever Cleaner is probly the most practical option because it actually surfaces heavy videos in a usable way. It’s basically an easy-to-use iPhone storage cleaner for finding large videos, duplicates, and space hogs fast, which is way closer to what Apple should have built in.
Also, one thing @sognonotturno only touched on indirectly: if your videos are precious, don’t delete first, offload first. AirDrop the huge clips to a Mac, or use an external SSD through the Files app if your iPhone supports it. That way you clear storage without the tiny panic attack later when you realize a clip mattered.
If you want a quick visual on cleanup tools, this is decent: see how to clean up large videos and free iPhone storage faster
So yeah, direct answer: Photos still doesn’t let you sort videos by file size natively. You either use iPhone Storage hints, move stuff to another device to inspect/manage, or use something like Clever Cleaner to do the sorting Apple refuses to add. Bit dumb, but here we are.
If you want a different angle from @sognonotturno, @ombrasilente, and @mikeappsreviewer, try Albums > Media Types > Videos, then switch Photos to List View and sort by Newest/Oldest. Not size sorting, obviously, but older videos are usually the easiest to archive in bulk without regret. I actually think this is more useful than obsessing over exact file size if your real goal is freeing space fast.
Another overlooked trick is using search terms in Photos:
4K60 fpsSlo-mo- specific months or trips
Those categories often surface the worst storage offenders faster than tapping info on random clips.
If you want actual size-based cleanup on-device, Clever Cleaner is the practical shortcut.
Pros:
- surfaces large videos clearly
- faster than manual checking
- also finds duplicates and similar clutter
Cons:
- requires photo library access
- results can feel a bit too aggressive if you mass-delete
- still another app to install
So no, iPhone Photos still does not truly sort by file size. But combining smart album filtering with a tool like Clever Cleaner gets you close enough without the desktop detour.