Elinweb Unused Media Finder

Elinweb Unused Media Finder scans your site and tells you which files in the Media Library are not used anywhere, where the others are used, and which files are exact duplicates. Then it helps you remove them with less risk.

A permanent delete removes the files from the server, so the plugin is built around caution: quarantine first (reversible), delete later, and refuse to continue when a scan looks wrong. No scan can see every use of a file, so keep a backup and quarantine before you delete.

What it does

• Scan. The database (posts, meta, options, terms, users, comments, plugin tables) and, if you choose, the code of the active theme and plugins plus CSS/JS inside uploads.
• Recognises how media is referenced. URLs (with size suffixes, -scaled, WebP, URL-encoded, \u-escaped, HTML entities, Unicode-normalised), ids (featured image, galleries, blocks, shortcodes), Elementor (loops, dynamic tags, V4), ACF / Secure Custom Fields, Meta Box, Pods, JetEngine, WooCommerce, Gravity Forms, Fluent Forms, WPForms, Contact Form 7 and Smart Slider.
• Live updates. After one full scan, saves in the admin are recorded without scanning again.
• Media Library integration. A “Usage” column and filter in list and grid mode, and a dialog showing every place a file is used.
• Unreferenced list. Card or list view, 20 to 500 items per page, preview, filter by type, sort by size or date.
• Duplicates. Files with identical content that were uploaded more than once. Sizes are compared first and only same-size files are hashed (MD5), so large libraries stay light. Attachments that share one file (media translations) are not duplicates, and only unreferenced copies can be selected. An option adds the extra files on disk, to catch stray copies of library files.
• Quarantine. Moves a file (all sizes and WebP copies) out of its public path into a closed folder, but still answers requests for the old URL and logs them. If nothing asks for it for a few weeks, delete it; if something does, restore it with one click.
• Extra files. Leftover sizes and files on disk that no media item owns, with a preview, the full server path, and a ZIP download of the selection.
• Unregistered sizes. Files generated for image sizes that no theme or plugin registers any more.
• Safety. A scan that reports a featured image as unreferenced is marked untrustworthy and quarantine and delete are refused. Attachments sharing one file move together.
• WP-CLI. wp elinweb-unused-media-finder scan|status|unused|usage|quarantine|restore|delete|keep

What it cannot see

Use outside your site (newsletters, social networks, other sites hotlinking a file) cannot be detected. That is why quarantine exists. Always take a backup before deleting.

Languages

English and Persian (fa_IR).