Help How can I optimize internal phone memory storage? Hitting ceiling...

[AMauler]

At the beginning of this month, I obtained a new ZTE Sonata 3 (Model Z832) when I transferred my provider to Cricket. It uses Android 6.0.1. Can someone please either instruct me or point me to an online article on how folk with non-high-end Android smartphones can optimize space on their phone memory to increase performance and efficiency without hitting the roadblock of memory ceiling limitations? I have installed a 32GB SD card with plenty of space available.

1. - Is there any way to install Apps to the SD card rather than to the internal phone memory?
2. - On TXT messages & SMS/MMS, is there anyway to save and use this from the SD card rather than from the internal phone memory?
3. - Any other suggestions on optimizing internal phone memory storage, either posted here or in an online article?

In Settings / Storage, I have "Save Location" set to "SD card", Device storage shows as 7.28 GB Used of 8.00 GB. Then clicking on Phone shows Available 736 MB, System memory 4.28 GB, Used space 3.01 GB, & Cached data 1.14 MB. Clicking on "Used space" shows Apps 1.90 GB, Images 128 KB, Videos 8.00 KB, Audio 40.00 KB, Other 1.13 GB. Really the only App I have installed of appreciable size is Messenger (225 MB, by Facebook) as I haven't figured out a way to use Messenger with Chrome... it forces you to install the App.

I just installed Messenger and maybe two other Apps, and the phone can't take any more. If I try squeezing another App in, then the productivity of the phone goes down as I constantly receive messages that the memory ceiling is being hit. Per the above three questions, can anything be done to stop this, to somehow have Android use the SD card more? Anything. Thanks.

 

[Hadron]

1. There are three possibilities:

(a) some phones still support the Froyo/Gingerbread style partial moving of apps to SD. Go into Settings > Apps > Downloaded, pick an app and see whether it has a "move to SD" button. If it has, even if greyed-out, it means your phone does have this feature. Then any app where that button is not greyed-out can be moved.

Things to note: not all apps can be moved (it's up to the developer), and it only moves part of the app and does not move the internal data of the app. But it will create some space, if supported.

(b) Android 6 introduced the option to "adopt" an SD card, incorporating it fully as an extension of the internal storage. Not all support it though, e.g. Samsung and LG did not include it in their flagships. I expect it's in the Storage settings somewhere, if your phone supports it.

If you do this then back up your card first, because making the card part of the internal storage will reformat it, erasing everything on it. It will also encrypt the card, so it will be useless outside of the phone unless you reformat it again (so no popping it in a card reader to copy files to/from it). You gain app space but lose flexibility.

(c) Root the phone, partition the card (back up first) and you can use things like the Link2SD app to move apps to the new partition on the card (more completely than you can with option (a)).

2. No. Though SMS take up very little space, it's only MMS that can be large.

3. Keep stuff that can be on SD on SD, i.e. photos, videos, music etc. If there are pre-installed apps you don't use, clear data for them, uninstall updates then disable (you can't remove them, but as the app itself lives in a different partition it's only their data and updates that use your space). If there are other apps you don't use, get rid of them and clean up any folders they have created in the internal storage (remember that /sdcard is part of the internal storage, the actual SD card has a different name).

And if you want to do FB messaging using a browser, make sure that browser is set to request the desktop site. FB have disabled messaging on the mobile version of their website because they want you to use the app (and like any and all corporations, they don't give a damn what you want).

 

[AMauler]

Thanks for your response.
1a - I do remember the "Move to SD Card" option for the Apps in my older phone from last year, but this new phone doesn't have it. It doesn't even have a "Downloaded" section, just All Apps, Enabled, & Disabled. I did go to an App I did download (Messenger from Facebook) and it just has "Uninstall" and "Force Stop". So much for technological improvement here.

1b - the "adopt" idea seems great, but it isn't available for my 6.0.1 Android. In "Storage" there is a "Save Location" where I have SD Card chosen, but it didn't reformat the card and I think it just sets the default location to save photos, screencaptures and such. I went into Gallery, and it looks like these image& video files are SD stored, but saved photos from any apps, such as Chrome downloads, Google Maps, or PhotoEditor are default saved to the phone (very aggravating).

1c - you lost me here, starting with "root the phone".

2 - This is unfortunate as I've used a backup App to transfer my phone log and SMS/MMS from from older phones to each subsequent newer phone. I suspect this may take up alot of memory space. Any ideas here? Maybe go through and delete images? I wish it would save to SD, or to use from a cloud.

3 - Is it advisable to disable "Android System Webview"? I disabled Deezer which Cricket had a thrill wanting me to join. Do you have any recommendations on disabling factory installed apps? Seems that all of the Google ones that I don't recognize has Disable greyed out.

I didn't know about the "Request Desktop Site" option in Chrome. It looks terrible, but if it'll save 260 MB of memory off the phone, Facebook Messenger is gone. I'll get used to it.

 

[AMauler]

I'm using Hangouts for SMS/MMS which is factory installed and has "Disable" greyed out in App info. There doesn't seem to be an option to sort by memory to try to find images taking up space. Any suggestions? Use another SMS/MMS app? Currently App info says it uses 75MB, but would this be just the App or all of the SMS/MMS data? If SMS/MMS data, then 75MB doesn't seem like much.

 

[tommo47]

Hi, it is still possible to move apps to the SD card with Android 6, but perhaps not on all devices. It certainly is on my HTC M9 as shown in the following screenshots :-



When you select an app in your app list, tap on 'Storage' (screenshot 1), if you have a 'Change' button (screenshot 2), the app can be moved. Tap the Change button and a selection menu will appear (screenshot 3).

I have moved a couple of apps but only those pre-installed/not removable eg. 'Amazon Appstore' and which I don't use. Fortunately I'm not short on storage space and I understand that moving apps to SD can adversely affect their performance.