Cleaning up your Android device

Android devices are used for many different purposes these days. They are used to play games, to store business related material, to organise or lives better, to carry out many office duties and to send and receive all types of messages and emails. The introduction of Android compatible apps has also increased in popularity with many apps used by most Android device owners. This all adds up and it’s not long before you have used up a lot of valuable space on your Android device.

This build-up of data, apps and other components has the potential to cause a lot of problems for an Android user. Devices become slower and less responsive. Even worse, there is an increased threat of viruses or files can become corrupted or damaged. It also means you are less organised and may find it difficult to locate important documents, videos, images, sound recordings or other files because your phone is so cluttered and unorganised.

Rooting your Android device.

Android rooting is the term used to describe mobile apps and other types of software that are able to access the root files of your Android device. Some of these apps are designed to clean up various parts of an Android device. Some rooting apps remove the bulky system apps that come with most Android devices. In most cases these are not required. This frees up space you may need for other reasons.

Find out what is taking up the most space on your Android device.

Some Android apps, files and directories take up more space than others. Find out which files and directories are the largest and are using valuable space. You may need to find out which files are required by your Android device and which are not from the manufacturer. You can also get advice from online resources such as technical blogs, forums and social media groups. Then decide which files and directories are needed on your mobile device and which files and directories can be backed up and deleted off your mobile device.

Using rooting apps can help you with this too because there are apps that give you access to the root files of your Android device. Once you know which files can be removed such as system apps you have access to these files and can safely delete them.

Don’t use your Android device as a storage device.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of using your Android device as a place to store important files, audio clips and videos. This is especially true for mobile Android devices. The convenience of these devices can also make users lazy about making backups and then removing files from their mobile device. Over time this adds up and will quickly clutter your mobile device. As well as this, it becomes more likely that you will find it difficult to find important files or misplace them. If your phone gets infected with a virus, not having a back-up can also have serious consequences, especially if you only store important files on your mobile device.

Backup and then remove the most common types of files.

For the majority of Android device users, images and videos are the most common types of files stored on these devices. A lot of users leave these images and photos on their Android device unnecessarily. They take up valuable space, so it’s a good idea to back them up by transferring them to a USB key, SD card or other storage device for later use.

Install an Android cleaner app.

Various apps have been designed to automatically clean up Android devices. Apps like the AVG cleaner for Android app clean up old history files and cache files that may be taking up valuable space on your Android device.

In the past we had different devices to look after different areas of our lives. Phones were used to make calls and text people. PC’s and laptops were used for gaming and work. This is no longer the case and an increased number of people are only using their mobile device to carry out all of the functions a number of devices used to carry out.