Remove old Exchange OWA versions

FXE 501 Reputation points
2021-03-23T08:54:11.1+00:00

Hi all,

We have 2 Exchange 2016 servers which have been running for more than 2 years now.
We have applied several CU during this period and now we can see that significative amont of disk space is used by old OWA versions (in %ExchangeInstallPath%ClientAccess\Owa and %ExchangeInstallPath%ClientAccess\Owa\prem).

How can I safely remove theses old versions ?

Thank you.
Regards,

Exchange Server Management
Exchange Server Management
Exchange Server: A family of Microsoft client/server messaging and collaboration software.Management: The act or process of organizing, handling, directing or controlling something.
7,326 questions
0 comments

6 answers

Sort by: Most helpful
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Andy David - MVP 140.8K Reputation points MVP
    2021-03-23T11:36:06.767+00:00

    I never do, but give it a try. Don't delete them just yet, move to another directory and test that everything still works. If no issues, remove them!
    https://webbanshee.net/remove-old-owa-versions/

    https://www.alitajran.com/remove-old-exchange-owa-files-to-free-up-disk-space/

    0 comments
  2. FXE 501 Reputation points
    2021-03-23T11:54:58.593+00:00

    Hi Andy and thank you for your answer.

    I've already seen these articles, but I'm not convinced about them as they are not Microsoft issued.

    Is there really not any official article about this context ?

    Regards,

    0 comments
  3. Andy David - MVP 140.8K Reputation points MVP
    2021-03-23T12:05:43.207+00:00

    No there isnt ;)
    If you look at the first article, you can see it references an old Technet forum question that I answered :)
    https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/f3731694-ae4a-47d8-b921-a61e47c2b757/remove-old-owa-files-after-cumulative-updates?forum=Exch2016GD

    I have always been of the opinion to just leave the old files there, but if you want to remove them, move them to another location first leaving the current ones and test :)

    0 comments
  4. FXE 501 Reputation points
    2021-03-23T14:08:27.777+00:00

    OK. Surprized about MS Exchange Team has never address this behavior.

    I moved all folder which not correspond to our current servers version to another folder.
    Wait and see until our Exchange servers next reboot.

    Thank you.
    regards,

  5. FXE 501 Reputation points
    2021-03-24T06:38:21.33+00:00

    Hi @Joyce Shen - MSFT ,

    Next reboot is planned next saturday night.
    I'll give you my feedback on next monday.

    Regards,

    0 comments