What can we say, 16GB of storage just isn't enough. When Apple released iOS 8 last fall, plenty of iOS owners got to experience that first hand.

When iOS 8 was released, scores of users were told they didn't have enough free space on their devices to upgrade without deleting files first or resorting to using iTunes.

See also: Apple sued for making the iOS 8 update too big

And because this is America, there's even a class action lawsuit being filed against Apple by users who claim being forced to use iTunes for an OS upgrade is just too much.

But even if you aren't running out of space to do iOS 8 upgrades, it's easy to find yourself running out of space on an iOS device. That's where a new Mac app, currently in beta, called Phone Expander, comes into play.

Phone Expander is designed to make it easy for a user to easily save space on their iOS device by deleting cache files inside apps, easily remove large apps installed on the device, remove pictures or videos (backing them up to the desktop first) and soon, manage music on their devices.

An app born of necessity

According to Joshua Keay from Magnetism Studios, a company that helped make the app, the app was born out of the experiences of both the developers and their friends.

"Apple's done a great job of creating worry free devices, but storage space is a consistent point of failure on iOS. When the user gets an 'out of space' error, they aren't really told what to do, so people resort to tiny steps like deleting a few photos, but that generally only buys them a little time before the problem crops up again," Keay said.

"Our focus was as much about educating the user on what is taking up the most space on their devices and then helping them empty those out quickly."

How it works

Image: Mashable screenshot Phone Expander

To test the app out, I decided to try it on my 64GB iPad Air. You might think that 64GB is enough space for an iPad. Perhaps. But that would mean I would have to get rid of some of the more than 600 apps I have installed on said iPad that I just don't have time to remove.

As it stands now, I frequently get "out of space" messages on my device. It's as if Apple is just mocking me, tempting me to upgrade to a 128GB iPad Air 2. Sorry Apple, not this year.

Phone Expander is easy to use. Simply plug your iOS device into your Mac and start it up.

The app offers up a number of different options:

Clear Temporary Files - This will clear temporary caches from within your apps that can take up lots of space. Lots of magazine apps, for instance, keep downloaded issues in the cache for offline reading. This is great for convenience, but it can take up a ton of space. You can selectively choose what apps you want to clear the cache from and what you want to leave alone — or clear the cache from all your apps. Image: Mashable screenshot Phone Expander

Remove Apps - Removing apps within iOS or in iTunes can be problematic if you have a ton of apps installed. Phone Expander makes it easy because you can see a listing of all your apps, sorted by size. As a result, I can figure out that I really don't need to have that 300MB Cartoon Network app installed. Image: Mashable screenshot Phone Expander

Clear Photos - This option lets users clear photos from their Camera Roll. The nice thing is that before it deletes a photo or large number of images, it backs them up to your desktop. That way you can put them on Dropbox or OneDrive or iCloud or whatever you want.

Clear Music (coming soon) - This feature isn't available in the current version of the beta, but soon you'll also be able to remove music from your device, with a similar method of backing songs up first.

How does it work

Using the "Clear Temporary Files" feature, I was able to save about 8GB of space from my iPad. Most of the caches deleted were from select games, magazine apps and from apps such as Spotify that have offline cacheing enabled.

I asked Keay if there were any challenges to building the app, as well as for clarification about how the cacheing feature works.

He told me:

Caches in iOS applications store data that is available elsewhere, mostly images and video from the web that the user has recently viewed. The operating system and the app itself are designed to clear these caches automatically but doesn't do it aggressively enough, so they pile up. User data, preferences and settings are stored in separate databases which are generally backed up via iCloud.

In my tests, none of the apps I deleted the caching from removed any game save data or preferences within apps themselves. That said, if you use a reading app (such as a magazine) or certain video apps that have offline video downloads, clearing the caches will probably require you to re-download those files again.

A solid, simple solution

Phone Expander is in beta right now for OS X. Keay says there are no plans for a Windows version of the app right now, but that "anything is possible."

Although the app is free to use while it's in beta, Keay expects that it will cost about $15 once it is released later this Spring.

For me, having an easy way to gain back space on my iPad makes the app a valuable addition to my Mac arsenal.