It’s happened to the best of us; we’ve tried to take a photo or download an app only to be told that we have insufficient storage space. It is, for want of a better phrase, a pain in the face. Here’s how to ensure that doesn’t happen to you again.
First up: read the data that's at your fingertips.
Every device allows users to see how their storage is being used.
On an iPhone: Settings - General - Storage & iCloud Usage - Manage Storage.
On an Android: Settings - Storage
This will illustrate, quite clearly, what is using the most amount of storage space on your device. If you take a lot of photos, your gallery will probably take up a bulk of your space. If you’re a music lover, that’ll take up quite a bit too. But don’t panic just yet, there’s ways to fix this!
If there's some applications on your phone that you use rarely or never, delete them. You’ll always be able to download them again if you end up missing them greatly. Chances are, however, you won’t even know they’re gone.
Music lovers - do you use Spotify, Apple Music, Google Music or just have your files on your phone? If you use a cloud based service like Spotify or Apple Music, don’t have all of your songs downloaded. Pick and choose what you have saved to the device and remember you can still access music from the cloud at any time. There’s no point in having a thousand songs on a phone if you can’t take a short video.
Photo lovers - back up. Seriously, take some time to save your photos to a secure, personal cloud and then get them off your device. Again, the cloud means you can access them anywhere, but they won’t be clogging up your device.
If you have a podcasting app, change your settings so that the latest episodes don't automatically appear. Also, make sure to delete episodes once you've listen through to them.
Micro SD card
If you haven't already, check to see if your phone has a MicroSD slot. iPhone users, this bit isn't for you; Apple don't allow their customers to expand memory in this way. Many Android devices do, however, so check it out. If your phone does have a Micro SD slot head out and buy a Micro SD memory card. You will get one of these in Carphone Warehouse, Harvey Norman or any other tech retailer. This will transform your device!
You can alter your settings to ensure that your photographs are saved onto the SD card, freeing up the phone's memory for applications and other functions.
