All those gigabytes of space seemed more than enough when you bought your smartphone. But have you been regularly getting the message that there is no more space on your mobile or is your smartphone running slower and slower? Then it’s time to clean it up.
In fact, it is the same with smartphones and tablets as with the PC. You buy one with a hard drive that seems big enough to last for years to come. And before you know it, it will be full of programs and files. This is partly because software manufacturers make their programs more extensive and larger over time. Because yes: today’s hard drives and memory are large enough. For example, the quality of photo and video files is also getting better. That also inevitably means much larger files.
The same story applies to smartphones and tablets, only the hard drive is the internal memory. So the internal memory that was the newest and largest possible a few years ago is now silting up. That’s why the overview below with tips that give your mobile space again.
Wherever the rest of this article says smartphone, you can also think tablet. Keep in mind that there are quite a few different Android versions. The options on your Android smartphone may therefore be slightly different than described in this article.
Expand memory
android
A simple solution that is also applied to the PC for space and performance problems is to expand the memory. Many Android smartphones allow you to insert a memory card into the device, which allows you to significantly increase the storage capacity in one fell swoop.
Do you not have that option or do you want an alternative to a memory card? Then an On-The-Go cable of about 5 euros can help. You connect an OTG cable to the mini- or micro-USB of your smartphone. On the other side is a normal USB connection to which you can connect, for example, a USB stick or a mini hard disk. This gives you an excellent backup option for, for example, your photos and videos. If you use a hard drive without its own power supply, take an On-The-Go cable with a power connection. An OTG cable is only suitable for Android devices, not the iPhone.
iPhone
iPhones have an internal memory of 16, 32, 64, 128 or 256 GB. If you have 256 GB, you can usually go ahead. But extra memory space is never gone. Many people still have the idea that an iPhone cannot be expanded with extra memory. That was indeed the case for a long time, but not anymore.
The Sandisk iXpand Flash Drive is a great solution for storing photos and videos outside of an iPhone. You connect this stick to the Lightning port of your Apple mobile. Then put your files on it. You can then transfer the media files back to a PC using the USB connection of the drive.
https://www.sandisk.nl/home/mobile-device-storage/ixpand
Clear the cache
A cache is storage space used by apps for temporary files. These are usually kept to make the app run faster. This is often used in internet browsers, among other things, to quickly view previously visited websites.
A disadvantage of a cache is that it takes up space. Especially if a large number of apps with a large cache work. By deleting as many of the temporary files as possible, you can free up quite a bit of space. The only drawback is that your smartphone will run a little slower with certain apps.
One option is to view the cache per app and possibly delete it. Note that not all apps use a cache:
android
- Tap on Settings.
- If necessary, tap General.
- Tap on apps or Application management.
- Tap the desired app, for example Chrome.
- If necessary, tap Storage area.
- Tap on Clear cache or Clear cache.
You can also clear the caches of all apps at once:
- Tap on Settings.
- If necessary, tap General.
- Tap on Storage.
- Tap on cache data or Cache memory.
- Tap on OK.
iPhone
- Tap on Settings.
- Tap on General.
- Tap on iPhone storage.
- Tap the desired app, for example Safari.
- Tap on Change.
- The cache data now has a round and red icon. To delete the data, tap that icon.
- Tap on Remove.
- Tap on Ready.
There are also special apps for clearing caches, and possibly other space hogs, on smartphones. For the iPhone, among others, Dr. Download cleaner from the store. For Android there is Cache Cleaner.
In part 2 of this article, learn how to free up space by uninstalling apps and cleaning up photos and videos.
