In this guide, we will show you how to free up space on your Samsung Galaxy phone. Whether it’s an old Galaxy S6 or a new Galaxy Note 8. If you’re running out of space on your Galaxy, things can slow down, apps won’t load, and other annoying issues can occur. We’ll show you how to manage your storage and get some of it back.
Samsung phones have a lot to offer, many have expandable storage, but after owning a device for a while, space starts to be an issue. Especially if you don’t have a micro SD card or have a 2-3 year old phone.
You’ll be happy to know that Samsung has several tools to help owners manage their storage. Older phones have “Smart Manager” and newer devices running Android 7.0 Nougat have “Device Maintenance”. Both apps are available in the settings menu on Samsung phones or tablets.
For older phones like the Galaxy Note 4 or Galaxy S6, we’ll start with the Smart Manager, then move on to some of Samsung’s newest devices. When you only have 32GB of storage, it’s easy to run out of space. Don’t worry, we’re here to help and we have an easy-to-watch video for you below.
Before we get started, it’s worth noting that both of these mods are quite useful. View detailed information about battery and battery usage, performance, storage and memory usage. These maintenance mods have a lot to offer, but we’re going to focus on the storage side of things. Here’s how to use these tools along with other ways to simultaneously free up space.
How to Free Up Space on Your Samsung Galaxy with Smart Manager
The first thing you will want to do is go to your settings menu and open the Smart Manager tool. From here, you will see a cast like our image below.
This is where the magic happens. You will see how much free space is available and you can easily delete unnecessary data, user data and other things. Scroll through the list and choose from the options that best suit your needs. When the phone has finished analyzing your storage first.
You can simply hit the delete key to clear unnecessary data like old files, cached data, thumbnails and more, or tap “Detail” to see a breakdown of everything in the categories. This will help you understand what’s where and what areas to focus on if you decide to use other apps to help free up space.
Next, go back to the main “storage” screen and tap on the second option, “Useless data”. Your phone can save cached files, residual files, etc. deletes. Your phone decides what to delete here, and it’s not something you can miss. So don’t worry about deleting photos or videos, it won’t happen. Let it finish, reanalyze and you’re ready.
If that wasn’t enough space, consider removing unused apps or follow this guide with 5 best apps to free up space on Android.
How to Free Up Space on Galaxy S7, S7 Edge, S8, S8+, Note 8 and more
Next, we’ll show you how to free up space using Device Maintenance on any Samsung device running Android 7.0 Nougat or higher. Basically, any new phone or tablet. The first thing you will want to do is go to your settings menu and open the Device Maintenance tab. From here, each category is split into multiple tiers for easy access and full controls.
The new Samsung Galaxy devices use the same basic system as previous models, instead only under Device Maintenance. It’s just a newer, more powerful and more advanced version of what we’ve detailed above. You get a dump of documents and downloads, pictures, audio, videos and all your apps. Each category shows how much storage is used. Then, if you have a microSD card, you will see it at the bottom.
In the middle of your screen, you will see a big button on new Galaxy devices. This is a very simple cleanup, but still effective. Samsung quickly frees up storage space by deleting junk files, data, cached information, thumbnails, ad files and video preview icons.
Now when you hit Clear, sit back and wait for it to finish. Expect to come back anywhere from 1-5GB of storage, depending on how much you use your phone. Think about every update, app update, or video you watch. All of these are temporarily saved on your phone. This deletes all that and clears your phone. I’m turning a new page forward for you.
Again, you can tab through each subcategory for more information or clear things out from each area. It is a good way to delete duplicate pictures, old videos, text messages, unused apps and more.
final thoughts
In closing, we recommend purchasing a microSD card and then moving apps to SD to free up more space. If you’re using a Galaxy S6, you don’t have a microSD slot. Instead, you’re stuck with how much space your phone has. In that case, consider deleting pictures, videos, apps, text messages or using these 5 apps to free up space on your phone.
At the end of the day, it depends on you becoming more storage conscious as you use your phone every day. If you take 10 photos to get the perfect shot, delete the bad ones. Don’t leave these for later, because for 1-2 years after doing this, there will be a lot of empty space and photos you don’t want or need.
Take a few minutes each month to clean pictures or videos or uninstall apps you no longer use and enjoy. That way, you’re not in a rush to delete anything and everything when your phone suddenly says you’re out of space and you can’t download apps or take photos. Before you go, check out these 65 Useful Galaxy S6 Tips and Tricks.
