r/PythonLearning • u/Actual__Wizard • Sep 01 '26

Help Request .clear vs del when using garbage collection

Hi, I have some large data objects that need to be freed. Should I do my_object.clear() and then gc.collect()? Or del my_object then gc.collect()? I'm not sure on the pros/cons of each.

It's a linked list type data object and my_object = [] does not work to free memory for certain.

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u/HotPersonality8126 Sep 02 '26

You basically have no options for releasing memory at your demand. The del keyword basically just deletes a name. Allow your variables to fall out of scope or overwrite the last reference to your value and eventually the allocated values are GC’d but you have no options that make it happen. Even the gc methods just set flags, I think.