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Space map — where your disk space went

When you're running low on a data disk (not the one Windows is on), Viktor doesn't clean it itself — it's your data, not a regenerable cache. Instead it shows you where the space went and what you can safely do about it. It's purely read-only: Viktor deletes nothing and moves nothing.

You get to the Space map two ways: the Space map button on the dashboard (pick a disk and hit Map it), or clicking the thermometer of a specific disk in the space cards — that starts mapping that disk right away, no extra clicking.

Which drives Viktor sees

So you know what Viktor handles where:

System drive (where Windows runs, usually C:) — watches its health and free space, and can clean it.
Data drives — internal and external USB HDD/SSD. Shows how full they are and offers the Space map (read-only); it never cleans them by itself.
Removable media (USB flash drives, SD/memory cards) — Viktor ignores them by default (they come and go; a full flash drive isn't a "PC health" issue). Still want to map one? Tick "Include removable" in the Space map window.
Cloud / virtual drives (Google Drive etc. mounted as a letter) — also ignored by default. Their "space" is fake (a cloud quota, not real disk space). Tick "Include cloud" to show them in the Space map — but read-only, and Viktor won't look for duplicates there, so it won't needlessly download files you only keep online.

An external USB drive (HDD/SSD) counts as a normal data drive — Viktor ignores only flash drives and cards, not USB hard drives.

What you'll see

At the top is a summary (how much is safe to clean, how much "look inside", how many duplicates) and the disk capacity. Below it are two parts: 🔍 Browse disk (a navigable view) and 💡 smart findings (collapsed colour categories — click a heading to expand and see the items; the size shows already on the collapsed heading).

🔍 Browse disk

A full navigable in-depth view — like a classic "disk usage" browser. You see folders and files sorted top-down by size, each with a bar and a percentage (the share it takes in the current folder):

📁 Games            [############        ]   412 GB   58 %
📁 Movies           [######              ]   190 GB   27 %
📁 Backups          [##                  ]    64 GB    9 %
🎬 holiday.mp4      [#                   ]    18 GB    3 %

Click a folder → step inside (the breadcrumbs at the top show where you are: D:\ › Games › steamapps).
".. (one level up)" takes you back; clicking a breadcrumb jumps straight there.
"Open in folder" opens the current place in File Explorer.

It's read from memory — the disk is walked once and navigation reads nothing more, so it's snappy.

Biggest files (across the whole disk, sorted top-down) have a type tag

(🎬 video, 🎵 music, 🖼 image, 📄 document, 📦 archive, 💿 disk image, ⚙ program/system…),

so you can tell at a glance what it is. Browsing folders in depth is up top in 🔍 Browse disk.

Colour buckets, so a dry number makes sense:

Bucket	What it is	What to do
🟢 Surely regenerable	unambiguous things where the name doesn't lie (`node_modules`, `__pycache__`, package and shader caches)	Regenerates / downloads again. Here "safe to clean" is on the mark.
🟠 Look inside	folders named `temp`, `cache`, `bin`, `obj` — the name can lie	On a data disk these can easily be your data or app files. Before deleting anything, open it and look.
🟠 Duplicates	bit-for-bit identical copies — only your data (video, music, photos, documents, archives, disk images)	Viktor shows them to you — you decide which to keep. System files (dll/exe…) it deliberately ignores.
🟠 Big and old	large files you haven't opened in a long time	Your data — Viktor doesn't touch it, only points it out.
🟠 File nests	a folder with an unusually large number of files (even tiny ones)	It can be junk (all `.tmp`) or a valuable library (hundreds of thousands of photos). Viktor shows the count and which extensions it's made of — look and decide, it doesn't touch it.
🟠 Known space hogs	typical big culprits: virtual disks (`.vhd`/`.vhdx` from WSL/Docker/Hyper-V), Steam's unfinished downloads (`steamapps\downloading`), installers (`.iso`/`.msi`) sitting in Downloads	For each one Viktor says right away what it is and what to do (compact the virtual disk, clear Steam through Steam, an installer just takes up space after install). It doesn't touch them.

Don't be fooled by a folder's name. A temp folder needn't be junk — you may well have important data in it. And bin may be a folder with an installed app's binaries (deleting it = breaking it). That's why Viktor does NOT mark generic names as "safe to clean", only as "look inside".

What you can do with the findings

Open in folder — for every item. Viktor shows it to you in File Explorer so you can look at what's really there.
Clean — only for the 🟢 surely regenerable bucket. Viktor deletes it directly and frees the space at once. It's safe precisely because this bucket is things that make or download themselves again (build artefacts, cache) — so they don't need hiding in the Recycle Bin. The 🟠 "look inside" bucket has no Clean button — there you look first.
Export to XLSX — saves the whole list (duplicates, big/old, safe to clean…) into a spreadsheet so you can go through it calmly in Excel. Works even without Office installed.

Mapping a full disk can take a few minutes; you can interrupt any time.

How it's safe

Viktor deletes nothing. The Space map only reads sizes. At the end of the listing it always says: "Viktor deletes nothing himself, he only shows — you decide."
Your sensitive data never gets into "safe to clean". The same hard safeguard as in cleanup makes sure profile paths (Documents, Desktop, OneDrive, passwords) don't slip in here. A Cache folder inside OneDrive, for instance, is not placed into this bucket.
Duplicates are verified honestly. Viktor doesn't mark two files as identical just by size — it computes their fingerprint (SHA-256), so a "duplicate" really means bit-for-bit the same.

Example

  Safe to clean: 2.3 GB   ·   look inside: 55.1 GB   ·   duplicates: 5.0 GB

  🟢 Surely regenerates — safe to clean  (~2.3 GB)
       node_modules                                     1.2 GB
         ↳ Build artefacts — your tools make them again on the next build.

  🟠 Name says junk — but look inside first  (~55.1 GB)
       downloads\temp                                  54.5 GB
         ⚠ Name says temp — but this may well be your real data. Look before you delete.

  🟠 File nests — lots of files in one pile (1)
       Photos\phone_backup
         126,480 files · ⌀ 3.2 MB · total 395.0 GB
         ↳ .jpg 82% · .mp4 12% · .heic 5% · (no extension) 1%

FAQ

Does Viktor delete anything from a data disk by itself?

No, never by itself. You can clean manually — and only in the green "surely regenerable" bucket (build artefacts, cache), where the freed space is released at once. Automatic cleanup runs only on the system disk (see What Viktor cleans).

What is a "file nest"?

A folder where a lot of files have gathered — hundreds of thousands, say. Even if each is small, together they take up space and, above all, slow down backups and File Explorer. Viktor shows how many there are and which extensions (a breakdown by type), so you can tell whether it's junk (all .tmp) or something valuable (hundreds of thousands of photos). It deletes nothing — it just points out the pile.

Why does it report a virtual disk (.vhdx) when I use Docker/WSL?

Because it's the most common invisible hog: a virtual disk never shrinks by itself, even when you clean up inside it. Viktor doesn't delete it — it just reminds you that after cleaning inside (e.g. docker system prune) you need to compact it (Optimize-VHD), otherwise it won't give the space back.

Does it also find a failing disk?

That's a different thing — disk health (data disks too) is handled by the Health check. The Space map handles where the space went, not whether a disk is failing.