How to fix "E: You don't have enough free space in /var/cache/apt/archives/."

Question

E: You don't have enough free space in /var/cache/apt/archives/.
root@kali:~# df -H
Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
udev            2.0G     0  2.0G   0% /dev
tmpfs           406M  7.0M  399M   2% /run
/dev/sda6        12G   11G  480M  96% /
tmpfs           2.1G   78M  2.0G   4% /dev/shm
tmpfs           5.3M     0  5.3M   0% /run/lock
tmpfs           2.1G     0  2.1G   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
/dev/sda8        58G  114M   55G   1% /home
tmpfs           406M   37k  406M   1% /run/user/0

Solution 1

If you're getting this error in a Docker container - it helped me to do a

docker system prune

Solution 2

Fixing this largely depends on where the cruft has built up.

1. Start with unnecessary packages and apt cache:

sudo apt autoremove && sudo apt autoclean
df -h

2. Use du to look for cruft in /var and /var/log.

sudo du -xh --max-depth=1 /var
sudo du -xh --max-depth=1 /var/log

If a lot of space is consumed by /var/log, I usually cleanup old log files with:

# Note, change +30 to the number of days you want to keep.
sudo find /var/log -mtime +30 -type f -delete

Other directories probably need to be handled differently.

3. Lastly, check if running processes have a lock on files pending deletion.

sudo lsof -nP | grep '(deleted)'
# If your system doesn't have lsof installed:
sudo apt install lsof 

If there are large files pending deletion, you may need to restart the process or daemon with the lock.

Solution 3

Wouldn't apt-get clean free enough space, there is a faster way, than resizing filesystems:

mv /var/cache/apt/ /home/
ln -s /home/apt/ /var/cache/apt

Make sure you there is no /home/apt directory beforehand.

Solution 4

I think var/cache/apt/archives is a bit full soo

apt-get clean packages

Solution 5

In my case, I was getting this error

E: You don't have enough free space in /var/cache/apt/archives/.

while installing a package inside Debian container.The problem got resolved by going to Docker :

dashboard -> Settings -> Resources 

and increasing the Disc image size from 60G to 80G

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Comments

[Freddy]

I don't know what /dev/sda7 is, but you have lots of free space in /dev/sda8. Maybe resize your /home and move the freed space to /?

[we.mamat]

ran this and i got 22 Gigs back 😎

[inostia]

If using minikube, do minikube ssh first to get into the VM.