If you’ve installed Miniconda on your Mac and no longer need it, perhaps because you no longer use your Mac to code in Python, you should uninstall it to free up space and prevent possible conflicts with other files on your Mac in future. In this article, we’ll show you a couple of different ways to uninstall Miniconda on your Mac.

What is Miniconda?

Many of us use our Macs for coding, and in recent years, much of that coding has been in the areas of data science — pulling data from onlines sources, analyzing it and presenting it in visual form — and machine learning, also known as artificial intelligence. Both those applications use Python as a programming language, and to code in Python on your Mac, you need a coding environment that includes Python itself, its dependencies, and other associated packages. Miniconda allows you to install and manage those tools.

How to uninstall Miniconda from your Mac with one click

The easiest way to uninstall Miniconda — or any other app — from your Mac is to use a dedicated uninstaller. We recommend CleanMyMac X. It allows you to uninstall any app with just a couple of clicks. You can also use it to reset misbehaving apps by removing all their settings files and to get rid of files left over by other apps that were not uninstalled properly. You can download CleanMyMac X for free here. Once you’ve downloaded and installed it, follow the steps below to uninstall Miniconda and any other app:

  1. Open CleanMyMac X and click Uninstaller in the sidebar.
  2. Locate the app you want to uninstall — in this case, python.app or anything with conda or Miniconda in its name — in the list of applications and select it.
  3. Click Uninstall.
All apps selected in the Uninstaller module of CMMX

How to uninstall Miniconda from your Mac manually

There are a few steps to uninstalling Miniconda manually. First, quit related processes and make any backups you might need:

  1. Go to Applications > Utilities and open Activity Monitor.
  2. Search for processes with Miniconda, conda, and Python in their name.
  3. If there are any running, select them and click the ‘x’ in the toolbar to quit them.
  4. Quit Activity Monitor.
  5. Go back to Applications > Utilities and open Terminal.
  6. If you want to make a backup of Miniconda, use the commands below. Press Return after each
    line.conda install anaconda-clean
    anaconda-clean --yes

Now, to removing Miniconda:

  1. Type this command to remove Miniconda followed by Return:
    rm -rfv ~/miniconda
  2. Quit Terminal.
  3. Open a new Finder window and navigate to your user directory. Press Command+Shift+[period] to display hidden files.
  4. Open the .zshrc file in Text Editor (.bashrc if you are using a version of macOS older than Catalina or have changed the default shell in Terminal to bash).
  5. Remove references to Miniconda and save the file.
  6. Open .zsh_profile or .bash_profile and delete Miniconda from the PATH environment variable.
  7. Launch Terminal again and paste the following command:
    rm -rf ~/.condarc ~/.conda ~/.continuum
  8. Quit Terminal.

Once you’ve done all that, all references to Miniconda should have been removed from your Mac.

How to reset Miniconda using CleanMyMac X

If your reason for uninstalling an app, say Miniconda, is that it’s misbehaving, you can try resetting it first. That may fix it and save you the bother of uninstalling and then reinstalling it. Here’s how to reset an app in CleanMyMac X.

  1. Open CleanMyMac X and choose Uninstaller in the sidebar.
  2. Locate the app you want to reset and select it.
  3. Click the dropdown menu next to the app’s name and choose Reset.
  4. Click the Reset button.
Other in Uninstaller module of CMMX

The next time the app opens, it will recreate its settings files. So, if they were causing the problem it was having, it should be fixed. 

Miniconda is an installer for Conda, which itself is an environment for coding in Python. Miniconda is the only Conda installer, and Conda isn’t the only way to code in Python on your Mac. So, if you have previously installed Miniconda and no longer use it, follow the steps above to uninstall Miniconda from your Mac.