How to free up space on your Android smartphone

No one likes to see the “Insufficient Storage” pop up, but at some point, we all have faced a space crunch on our phones. Maybe your device is full of large photos and video files, perhaps you have downloaded way too many apps. Or your device might be older with lesser storage space as compared to the newer phones. Whatever be the reason, we need to clear up our phones for them to run smoother. 

Here are a few ways in which you can clean up your Android smartphone to make more space for all your important files: 

7 ways to clean up your Android smartphone

In order to start cleaning up, you first need to understand what exactly is taking up space. If you just go to your “Settings” and open up “Storage”, it will give you a breakdown of how much space is occupied by your Apps, System, Images and Videos, Audio files, etc. 

Once you have an idea of what area needs your attention, you can get to clearing unwanted files up. Here’s how: 

1. Uninstall a few apps.

2. Clean up your files.

3. Delete WhatsApp files.

4. Get rid of unwanted photos and videos.

5. Clear cache.

6. Remove Spotify and YouTube downloads.

7. Clear Google Maps data.

1. Uninstall a few apps

The more apps you have on your phone, the slower it gets. So, the first thing to consider while cleaning up your phone is whether you really need all the apps that you have installed. 

ALSO READ: 10 best free cloud storage services for backup in 2024

If you come across an app you haven’t used in a while, uninstall it. It’s super easy! You can just long press on the app’s icon and select the “uninstall” option. 

You can also access the list of apps from your settings menu to uninstall one. Here’s how: 

Step 1: Open the settings menu and tap on the “Apps” menu. 

Step 2: Select “All apps”. This gives you a list of every app that you have on your phone, along with how much space it is taking up.

Step 3: Go through the list and determine the apps you don’t want. Tap on it and select “uninstall”. 

2. "Clean" up your files

Android has made clearing unwanted junk from your phone easy. Just open “My Files” or “File Manager” on your phone and tap on “Clean”. It will guide you through a list of things you need to delete such as trash, duplicates or even blurry photos. 

Here’s what you can do in your Files app to get some more storage: 

i. Clear the junk files by simply tapping on “Clean”.

ii. Go through your downloads. They might contain files and folders from months ago that you don’t need anymore. Start deleting these files.

iii. Only keep the original pictures, videos or files and delete the duplicates. 

iv. Go through “large files”. These take up more space than your average photos and videos. Delete anything that’s not required.

3. Delete WhatsApp media

You might forget all the “good morning” photos, relatable videos, and funny gifs, but your phone stores them all. Deleting these from WhatsApp occasionally is a good practice even if your phone has enough space for more apps and files. 

You can delete it through “Files” or from the app itself. Here’s how to do it from WhatsApp: 

Step 1: Open WhatsApp, and click on the three dots on the top-right corner. 

Step 2: Go to the settings menu and tap “Storage and data”. 

Step 3: Now, select “Manage storage”, and then “Review and delete items” to clean up all the files that are taking up precious space. 

4. Get rid of the unwanted photos and videos

Delete those old screenshots, you won’t be revisiting them as often as you’d like to think. These memes, old receipts, or food photographs that are already on your Instagram stories don’t need to occupy space on your phone anymore. Delete them along with any huge video files that you might not watch on a regular basis. You can back them up on cloud storage and go back to them at your convenience without them filling up your phone.

5. Clear cache

A bit of storage is used by an app’s cached data as well. It makes your user experience smoother and saves a bit of your mobile data. Clearing this cache doesn’t just save you space, it also ensures that your phone is more secure. 

Here’s how to clear your app cache: 

Step 1: Go to the settings and open “Apps” 

Step 2: Tap on “See all” and choose any app 

Step 3: Go to “Storage” and then tap “clear cache” 

ALSO READ: WhatsApp is now counting media backup against Google Drive storage

It is also a good practice to clear your browser cache. 

Here’s how to clear your Chrome browser cache: 

Step 1: Open Chrome and tap on the three dots. 

Step 2: Go to “History” and then select “Delete browsing data”. 

Step 3: Choose a time range of how far back you would like the stored cache to be cleared and then select “clear data”.

6. Remove Spotify and YouTube downloads:

Dear Spotify Premium users, it hurts when the boon of downloads turns into a curse. But, the fact remains that any songs and podcasts you download take up space, especially if you use a higher audio quality. 

Consider deleting a few of them. Here’s how you can do it: 

Step 1: Open Spotify and choose “Settings” from your profile icon. 

Step 2: Go to “Storage” and remove the downloads. 

ALSO READ: Google One: Price, storage and how it’s different from Google Drive

The same applies to downloaded videos on YouTube. Check your library for videos you’ve already watched or don’t really need, and delete them. Here’s how: 

Step 1: Go to the “Downloads” from your profile. 

Step 2: Tap the three dots next to the video you want to remove and choose “Delete from downloads”. 

7. Clear Google Maps data:

If you are someone who makes use of Google Maps regularly, you might have a bunch of maps downloaded to access them offline. These, again, take up space. Here’s how to delete your downloaded maps: 

Step 1: Open Google Maps and go to “Offline maps” from your profile. 

Step 2: Tap the three dots next to the map you want to delete, and then hit delete.

Losing your data is a less-than-desirable solution, so if your Android phone has an SD card, use it. You can shift all your photos, videos or large files to the SD card and save some internal storage space. Or you can make use of cloud storage services as well.