How to free up storage space on Android

It makes sense to save everything that is significant to you on your phone because the majority of us use our phones for several hours each day.

But it does imply that the storage on your phone might soon get full. Nowadays, the majority of smartphones have at least 128GB of storage, while some still have 64GB or even less. You may find yourself running near to capacity or get the dreaded “low storage” warning because a significant portion of that is used by Android itself.

You can get around this problem on many phones by inserting a microSD card into the SIM tray, which will allow you to move large files off of your internal storage. But what if your phone isn’t compatible with it?

Another option you might have thought of is moving everything to another device and executing a factory reset, although that’s frequently more extreme than required.

Fortunately, there are a few quick actions you can do to significantly increase the amount of space available on your Android phone. Even if you haven’t had any storage problems yet, maintaining your storage effectively may assist keep things running smoothly in terms of performance.

Move photos and videos into cloud storage:

Among the items on this list, this one could have the most influence. The more space that accumulates from photos and movies, the less likely you are to want to go through everything.

Fortunately, Google Photos comes pre-installed on practically all Android smartphones. Free 15GB of storage is available to anybody with a Google account, albeit it is split across Gmail and Google Drive.

Here’s what to do if you’ve never set it up before or if the app isn’t already installed:

1. Search for Google Photos on the Google Play Store by opening it.
2. Tap “Install” next to the applicable result.
3. When the installation is finished, select “Open.”
4. Tap “Allow” when asked to provide access to the pictures and videos on your smartphone.
5. Make sure you choose “Turn on backup” from the next screen.
6. Choose between “Original quality” and “Storage saver” on the next screen. The latter, however of poorer quality, enables you to store more.
7. Delete the first three highlights pages.
8. You should get a message stating “Backup is on” when you tap your symbol in the upper right corner. The process of backing up

The application may now be left to back up in the background. Up to that 15GB limit, all of your locally saved pictures and movies will now be automatically uploaded here and made accessible on all of your devices. In order to continue using unlimited free storage after June 2021, you will need to purchase a Google One membership. Prices for plans begin at $1.99/£1.59 per month.

There are other choices like pCloud, which provides 10GB of free storage, and the choice of one-time lifetime pricing. There are other options to take into account, but for the majority of users, Google Photos’ free tier is the best choice. Even moving a little portion of your information will have a big impact.

Move data to Google Drive:

It makes sense to utilize Google’s other cloud-storage services as well since you’re using a phone with a Google-owned operating system. All of your document files may be migrated to Google Drive, even though they will all use far less space (unless you have a lot of them or, for example, a lot of multi-page PDFs). By doing so, a valuable backup will be made of those files, making them available from any internet device.

You receive 15GB for free, along with Google Drive and Gmail, as was previously announced. But all three will be covered by a single Google One membership.

On your phone, there isn’t a mechanism to automatically upload files to Google Drive, but doing so manually is simple:

1. Open Google Drive
2. You’ll most likely see the ‘Suggestions’ page. If not, touch it from the screen’s top.
3. Tap the Plus symbol in the bottom-right corner.
4. You’ll have a choice from six possibilities. The most pertinent option is “Upload.”
5. If the program asks, grant it access to your files, then look for the file you want to upload.
6. Tap any file to upload it, or hold down the button to pick several files at once.

The files will now be uploaded to Google Drive and available across all your devices.

Delete WhatsApp media:

Stopping WhatsApp from storing photographs and videos to your phone is simple enough. Did you realize that the WhatsApp app itself also saves any material you send?

There are ways to handle many of these files from within the program, even though you no longer need or desire them:

1. Open WhatsApp
2. Select “Settings” by tapping the three dots in the upper-right corner.
3. To manage storage, tap “Storage and data” first.
4. A summary screen of all of your chats and large files will be displayed to you. You may either tap any one and select the files you wish to remove or you can select all.

 Delete your downloads:

Everyone always forgets about downloads, which are frequently kept in a folder that is forgotten long after they have served their purpose. If you don’t already have one, you can get a free file browser software from Google Play. Now go for the Downloads folder and delete anything unnecessary.

However, it’s also worthwhile to remove downloaded files from your preferred online browser. If Chrome, then:

1. Open the Chrome app
2. Select “Downloads” by tapping the three dots in the upper-right corner.
3. Press and hold any files you wish to remove on the next screen, then hit the trash can icon in the top-right corner.

Be careful since you won’t be asked to affirm that you are okay with their being erased. Any mobile web browser will be able to complete the operation.

Delete unwanted apps and games:

Sometimes users assume they have removed all the trash they downloaded from Google Play when all they have done is search for and remove any useless applications from their home screen. Even worse, there are occasions when they just remove the shortcut icon, leaving the program to linger in the app drawer. The ability to remove applications from the home screen is not available on all Android devices.

The Apps section in Settings is the best place to look for uninstalled apps and games. If your device has a Downloaded tab, make careful to only glance at that if you don’t want to delete anything crucial because it doesn’t appear recognizable to you.

Alternatively, you may use the Google Play Store to view a list of the applications and games you’ve downloaded:

1. Open the Google Play Store
2. In the top-right corner of the screen, tap your symbol and select “Manage apps and device.”
3. Make sure ‘Installed’ is chosen when you tap the ‘Manage’ option at the top of the screen.
4. Check the box next to the program you want to remove, then click the trash symbol in the top-right corner.
5. Tap ‘Uninstall’ to confirm

Just because you paid for them doesn’t mean you shouldn’t remove them. Any prior Google Play purchases can be re-downloaded for free at a later time.