How to Free Up Storage Space on Your Smartphone

Running out of storage on your smartphone happens sooner than you’d think. A couple years of takes, videos, screenshots, apps, and software downloads will have your phone sending you signals of low storage in no time.

The good thing is you don’t need to delete the memories you made or apps you use on a need to know basis. A strategic clean up of storage begins with knowing which apps are getting used the most and which consume the most storage.

What About That Burst Of Storage On My Phone Though?

Smartphones hate being put away. Your phone’s storage gets used the second you start taking photos, recording videos, downloading software, and installing apps.

The stuff that takes up storage the most is photos and videos, especially if you’re recording in high quality. Apps do this too, and so do messages, since images and videos that are sent are sometimes saved locally.

Cached data can take up storage as well, especially if you’re using a messaging app that tends to hoard data. Files that you forgot about can take up huge amounts of storage too. Screenshots, temporary files, old documents, video recordings, and downloads take up storage, but serve no purpose.

Check Your Storage Before Deleting

There’s always the option of looking to see what is taking up all your storage.

Read the above examples and decide which you may wish to rid.

Both iPhones and Android devices have storage management screens that show breakdowns of how your storage space is used. Although some menu items have changed depending on your device model and software version, they generally show space used by applications, photographs, videos, messages, system data, and other files.

This information lets you efficiently target how you manage your storage. For example, if space is mostly used by photographs and videos, you will not make much of a general impact by removing a few small applications.

Start by working through the larger storage space categories.

Start By Removing Large Videos

Videos can actually be more space intensive than images. High-quality videos and videos recorded using the slo-mo feature can be surprisingly large files.

Open your photo or gallery app and look through the videos to find large space-consuming files. Duplicate files, accidental recordings, recordings that you do not need, and purposefully recorded files that only have a temporary significance may be useful to delete.

Make sure to copy any video files that you deem to be valuable prior to deleting them.

If you have important videos in your phone, such as family videos and travel videos, it is a good idea to have a copy of those videos in a trusted computer, an external storage device, or a secure cloud instead of just having a copy on your phone.

Delete Unnecessary Screenshots

Screenshots are easy to take and also easy to forget.

For example, you may take a screenshot to show someone something, be it a product, a conversation, an address, a payment receipt, a recipe, or something else. A few months from now, you may still have screenshots that you took but do not need anymore.

Continuing with the screenshots example, you don’t really have to keep screenshots of things that you know you can also access later, like pictures and food delivery receipts. Also, try to avoid saving screenshots of things that you only do for a week or two like documenting your calorie tracking or progress in a video game.

Remove anything that has no purpose. If you have to keep a screenshot, consider if the original or a permanent note would be easier to refer to.

This is one of the first things you should do when trying to get rid of files without losing memory for your photos.

Search for Duplicate Pictures

It’s easy to take duplicate photos these days. Taking several photos, saving photos in messages, and downloading the same photo again are all common ways that copies quickly accumulate.

Many phones can identify duplicates these days. If your phone has a similar feature, make sure you actually are reviewing each photo and aren’t just deleting everything.

Not all similar looking photos are exact duplicates. You might want to keep different versions of important photos.

Clean up Your Downloads Dissection

The Downloads folder is another known spot for old files.

Pictures, PDFs, videos, installers, and all sorts of other files can sit in this folder forever after their initial use.

Go to your file manager and check the files you have downloaded. Trash anything that is clearly extra or completely irrelevant.

With files in particular, be careful. An innocent looking file could hold important info that you will need later. Trash it if you doubly sure you don’t need it.

Clean up Your Messaging Apps

Media attachments in messages can add up. There’s photos, videos, messages, documents, and so much more that can accumulate.

Review the section of your messaging apps that deal with storage management. Some of these allow you to see how particular conversations or media types use storage the most.

It’s possible that you’ll come to learn that some large media files occupy a much greater amount of storage space than the cumulative total of many smaller text messages.

It’s worth considering removing large file attachments on conversations one by one to manage space because most apps give you this option.

Review Applications You Don’t Use Anymore

The storage space of your devices is taken up not only by the applications that you use actively, but also by those that are unused.

These may include applications for a specific occasion such as a trip, plan, project, or event. If you haven’t opened those apps in many months, delete them.

You may also find an option on your device to archive or temporarily remove applications. This allows you to remove the application, but keeps the information that you may later need to reinstall the app.

Be sure to know what information in the app will be available after you remove it.

Be Mindful When Deleting App Data

There are other types of data that are saved by applications, for example, loading images, videos resources or many web pages. This data might not be obvious and can take up significant space.

Some versions of Android let you clear cached data for applications, although the way that it works and what applications it affects varies.

Given the specific way storage is organized on iPhones, there is no blanket clear cache button. Removing and re-downloading certain apps may be the only way to delete app data.

You have to be cautious about the data you delete since there may be important data stored locally.

Be Mindful Of Cloud Photo Sync

Cloud based photo services can cut some local storage requirement for photos, but you should understand how the system works before deleting anything. A service may keep a full size copy of your photos on the cloud while optimizing the space used on your local storage.

Your phone should support this feature and you should have enough cloud storage for this to be useful.

One downside to this is that if you delete a photo on one of your devices, it gets deleted from all the synced copies.

You should read the fine print for features that allow you to delete local copies of photos.

Avoid Ignoring Offline Downloads

There are many applications that provide the ability to cache data for offline use. Offline downloads are handy when you have no or slow internet connection, especially when traveling, however cached data can take up large amounts of space.

Music and map services usually let you have large amounts of local copies of their data. You should review these applications and clear data that you no longer need.

Removing data that is stored offline can free up space without having to delete applications.

Look at Your Browser Downloads

Files can be stored as downloads within browser applications.

If you download files from the internet, it’s worth going through your browser download history and checking your file manager.

Get rid of temporary downloads that you don’t need. Keep the files that you may need. To avoid losing files that get easily lost, move them to a clearly named file instead of keeping them as downloads.

Use Storage Recommendations

Storage recommendations can even be automated on your smart device.

These can detect large files, duplicate photos, unused apps, or similar content.

While there is an automated recommendation system, it is advisable to leave anything stored on the device to your discretion. Automated Cleanup may disregard files that may be important to you.

What You Should Not Delete

It is not a good idea to view a storage cleanout as a game to remove as many files as possible.

These files can include system files, applications, documents, photos, and login information, and other important files. Locally stored files may be lost and cannot be recovered. It is always better to back up important files.

A few gigabytes of space may seem insignificant, but losing important files is never worth it.

How Much Free Space Should You Maintain?

There is not a set answer as to how much room on their phones, users should keep free. It depends on the settings and apps users have on the phone, and what they use it for most.

Maintaining a few hundred MBs of free space is beneficial. If you’re running too close to the storage limit in your phone’s memory, then you may encounter issues when you try to install updates, save files, take pictures, and use apps normally.

Make it a habit to empty a few hundred MBs if you start to run out of space. It’s better to empty it in several small installments than wait until it’s filled to the brim. This will keep you from getting into a situation where you can’t install important system updates.

A Fast and Simple Once Monthly System Clean Up

Doing a monthly clean up only takes a few minutes and can prevent a system storage problem.

The first step of the process is to check your storage breakdown. Once you have the breakdown, it’s easy to determine which files can be safely deleted. Large files to consider include videos, photos, downloads, attached messages, unused Application data, and offline content.

The goal is to keep your storage clean, reduce clutter, and manage your phone battery efficiently before it’s too late.

What If A Cleanup Doesn’t Help?

In some cases, trying to system clean can be a waste of time. This usually means that your device just doesn’t have enough space to accommodate how you use the device.

High resolution videos, and photos, large media downloads, and frequently using large Apps can cause some people to run out of space. If you reach this point, it is time to buy a device with more capacity.

Organizing files can require a lot of time, but if you have an overflowing smartphone, files only need to be organized once. Begin with a quick overview of your storage usage. It’s likely that large, infrequently used files like videos and photos, attachments, duplicate files, media, and application data are using the most storage.

Think of metadata and other data files before deleting images or other important files. Huge videos, repeated photos, html files, media downloads, and application data can take up a ton of space on your phone. If any of this is files you’re not ready to get rid of, make sure you store a copy of it somewhere safe.

Emptying your phone is really helpful, but if it fills back up it can be overwhelming. Your phone can be a really efficient tool instead of just a text and internet machine. Windows popping up left and right telling you that you are low on storage is one of the smartphone’s least used features. Make sure you get to use all of your smart phone’s features!

Frequently Asked Questions

How can I free space on computer storage?

Clearing up your desktop and deleting unused downloads is an easy way to free up space on you computer. Cleaning up miscellaneous files is a good habit. It’s all too easy to save an attachment or a pdf to your desktop and forget about it. If you need space, you should be checking your Desktop for large files.

Files on your Documents and Pictures folders also get out of control. Old photos should be moved out of your Pictures folder, and old Documents should be placed in a similar folder of your choosing.

With these regular habits, space on your computer will never fill up quickly again.

Cleaning up smart phone storage is not worth the time.

A lot of people deal with storage full warnings and low storage drive energy, all the time. Streaming files and applications take up a lot of space and aren’t used as frequently as people realize. Files get saved, uploaded, and downloaded to your smartphone without notifying you and take up storage in the background. Large videos, photo attachments, old media, unnecessarily saved files, and unused applications can easily be removed. If you delete media, documents, and application data that matters, you will eventually run out of space.

To free up space on your smart device, you have to make sure you avoid transferring or saving application data. Otherwise, space will continue to fill up.

Should I clear my app cache?

Clearing your cache is safe if your operating system provides the option. However, the way it behaves is somewhat unpredictable. Also, it is generally better to avoid removing application data if you have no idea what information that data houses and the ramifications of its removal.

Why is my phone storage full after deleting files?

Many files, once deleted, are only moved to the “Recently Deleted” or “Trash” folder. This means that they still take up space on your device. In addition to this, applications, cached app data, system files, downloaded files, and many other files can consume storage on your device.

How often should I clean my storage?

You should do this every couple of weeks at most. If you take a lot of videos or download huge files to your phone, you may want to do this more often.