Speed, everyone wants to get things done fast. Be it surfing the web, playing video games (man, those lags are annoying) or even when using your phone.
I once had instances when my phone would get super slow and I’d get so mad and just do a factory reset.
Yeah, it’s a bit too much but I’m not very good with waiting (don’t judge me, I know there’s a lot of impatient people out there reading this).
Anyways, with time, I got to understand that there are certain things we may be doing to our phones that make them slow.
Today, I’m going to share 10 of them.
Unless you’re using a really old phone that’s very much outdated with about 500mb of RAM, please tag along.
Just kidding, doesn’t matter, you can still use some of the tips even if your phone is outdated.
For those that are still new to phones, RAM is the part of your phone or computer that manages all the activities that are being carried out. The higher the RAM, the more the activities and speed.
1. Update all Your Apps
Sometimes the apps we have on our phones may contain bugs or errors, they slow our phones down.
Always ensure your apps are up to date because apps get updated so those bugs can get fixed.
Ensure you always visit the Google Play Store on your phone at least once a week to get your apps updated.
2. Reduce Animations
Reducing animations not only speeds up your phone, but it also saves your battery.
Yes they make transitions look fancy but if you’re after speed, you might as well disable it.
To do this, you have to enable “Developer options”.
I’ll guide you through every step:
- Go to “Settings” on your phone and look for “About Phone” (usually the last item on the list) and select it.
- You should see “build number” on the list, tap it continuously until you get a “You are now a Developer” message.
- Hit the back button to get back to “Settings” and you will notice a new item called “Developer options”
- Open Developer options and enable it by turning it on
- Go through the list till you find “Window animation scale“, “Transition animation scale” and “Animation duration scale”
- Mine is already off but, you can do the same by tapping and selecting “Animation off”.
- It should automatically save, so hit back twice and you’re done.
3. Use Light Apps and Browsers
Heavy apps slow down your phone because they take time to load and end up using a lot of phone resources.
If you’re always surfing the internet (like me), I suggest you use light browsers. Check my list of browsers to choose one that is light.
Also, I don’t use a lot of apps that have website versions that basically do the same thing e.g I don’t have a Facebook app cause I prefer going on Facebook on my browsers.
4. Turn Off Auto-Sync
Turning off auto-sync stops apps from continuously using your RAM and data in the background.
I don’t usually encourage doing this, but it helps to keep your phone running fast.
Auto-Syncing helps to keep your data online from time to time. For example, the contacts on your phone usually get synced with your Google account so whenever you change your phone (or worse case lose your phone), you can get your contacts back when you log in to your Google account on your new phone or on your computer.
To disable Auto-Sync:
- Go to settings and search for “Accounts” and select it
- Tap the menu icon on the top right and turn off Auto-Sync data.
- Select “OK” and you’re done.
5. Clear RAM
Whenever you’re done using your phone, it is always a good idea to clear the RAM.
I do this to free it up so if I want to use the phone again, it doesn’t lag.
You can do that by hitting the recent button on your navigation bar and removing the list of running apps by either swiping on the apps manually or by hitting the round icon to do it automatically.
6. Uninstall Apps You Don’t Need
Having too many apps on your phone can really slow it down. Not just that, it can also limit the functionality of the phone.
Imagine your phone as a room and you as the owner put a lot of stuff in it, whenever you want to use that room, you are careful, you can’t run through it, if you do, you might hit something and everything will come crashing down.
It’s the same thing for your phone. Remove apps you don’t need so your phone can have room to breathe and roam free.
7. Turn Off Your Internet
If you won’t be using your phone for a while, turn off your internet.
All those apps that work in the background will notice that the internet is turned off and they won’t bother your phone with background processes anymore.
8. Delete Things You Don’t Need on Your Internal or External Storage
Just like tip 6, your phone needs all the space it can get to roam free.
If you have a lot of stuff on your storage, delete them.
Better still, you can get a bigger SD card with double your current size, or you can move stuff from your phone to your computer.
One thing I tell people to do first when they are running low on storage is to delete their old WhatsApp database files.
To do this:
- Go to your File Manager, select Internal Storage and search for a folder called “WhatsApp”.
- Open the folder and you should see another folder called “Databases”.
Open the Databases folder and delete all the files that have dates as part of their names.
I just got over 1GB of database files deleted, you could get more.
Always do this from time to time.
9. Restrict Apps form Using Internet
You must have noticed a time when you turned on your internet and your phone was freezing from time to time.
Well, that’s because all those internet hungry apps are going crazy and using your data in the background. You should stop them.
I have written a detailed way of stopping them here.
10. Update Your Phone
Sometimes you may be doing everything right but your phone may still be slow.
Well, don’t worry, it may just be that the problem is from your manufacturer.
Always make sure you check for software updates. Like I said, bugs get fixed with updates and your phone may be getting its fix on the next update.
To check for updates:
- Go to Settings
- Select About Phone
- Select System Update. (Your phone may be different but you should be able to find it in the “About Phone” area).
After selecting System Update, your phone should check for updates (make sure you have internet and not restrict System Updates when you want to do this).
You can download and install the updates from there if there’s any available.
Conclusion
Well guys, those are the 10 ways you can use to speed up your phone.
Always ensure you restart your device if you’ve taken a lot of steps.
Do you have more tips or questions? Put them in the comments and I’ll respond.
Let me know if this helps you.
See you next time.
