Why is my Nokia phone slowing down? Here are 6 common reasons
|We all know the general rule – the stronger the hardware, the better the performance. But is it always the case? It is impossible for a weaker processor to complete a task faster than a stronger one. Also, you cant have more open applications in 6 GB of RAM than in 12 GB. However, many owners of hardware cheaper Android devices often reach for stronger ones, without considering other options.
In this article, we’ll try to explain why your Android phone works slower, regardless of its hardware.
IGNORING AND POSTPONING SOFTWARE UPGRADES
This is a mistake that a huge number of Android users make. Many of them ignore system warnings, while others endlessly snooze dealing with the fact that their cell phone will be out of order for ten or fifteen minutes for the upgrade to complete.
The mobile phone manufacturer sends a push notification that the upgrade has arrived and is ready for installation, but on devices, it often happens that this is not the case. Therefore, if you see that you haven’t received an upgrade for a while, apart from just a higher Android version, but also security patches, don’t wait. Reach into the settings menu and find the item about checking the availability of the upgrade. If it’s there, make sure to download it within a reasonable period and start the upgrade process.
The security patches are even more important than the Android version number. If your mobile phone is not up to date with the latest security protocols, the likelihood of a harmless application being installed increases at a high rate. This will slow down your phone even more
EXCESSING ALLOWED BACKGROUND PROCESSES
Background processes are designed to make using the device as simple and pleasant as possible. For example, while you’re surfing the web in a browser, the background process of the WhatsApp application is in charge of notifying you of an incoming message. The same applies to emails, but also some less necessary services. By using too many applications, you become unaware that all of them ask for permission for background processes during the installation.
If it’s an application that needs to occasionally use the internet to update data, you’ll certainly allow it to manage background processes, but there are often many that do the same without a necessary need. For example, a weather forecast application must have granted access to background processes to refresh the status in time and possibly warn you of an upcoming storm, but its refresh rate doesn’t need to be active every 5 or 15 minutes. The shorter the time interval, the more congested the background processes will be. This will directly affect the speed of the mobile phone, as well as the battery consumption.
At the start, you have to set priorities. Of course, you will allow e-mail client or, for example, WhatsApp applications continuous access to background processes, but consider whether this is necessary with social network applications. The same applies to the already mentioned weather forecast, but also to many other applications. Moreover, sometimes it happens that even bizarre applications such as flashlights ask you for access permission for background data, which makes absolutely no sense. Therefore, during each installation, it is necessary to read the requested permissions and consider whether each is necessary.
USING TOO MANY WIDGETS
Widgets are of great importance to Android devices and as such they help us to navigate through the jungle of applications and their functions. However, this is the case as long as you don’t use go wild. By adding too many widgets to home screens, their purpose itself is lost, as it creates additional chaos. The aftermath is, once again, poor performance.
What’s even worse is the fact that each widget requires its background process, its place in working memory, and ultimately, its power channel from an already poor battery. Set the widgets that you need, while you can also optimize others. Many applications offer to adjust the widget’s auto-refresh interval
STORAGE OVERLOAD
If your phone comes with 128 or even 256 GB of internal memory, it may seem like infinity at first. However, after a few months, it will be filled with photos, videos, various memes, screenshots, and a lot of other content that you have forgotten about in the meantime.
At the moment when the capacity reaches a critical percentage, the device will usually warn you that it is time to get rid of unnecessary content. Many mobile phones today have tools for recognizing the same or similar photos.
Another big thing that slows down your phone is the cache. Cache files are being used for faster start-up and operation of applications that use multimedia content, such as web browsers, but it often happens that the cache occupies a large part of the memory, which slows down the device.
That is why it’s very important that you either use the already built-in optimization tools or manually delete cache from applications that you don’t use so often. Some applications allow this action within their own settings menu, while for others you have to go to the phone settings. When you spot the application management, select the desired one and tap empty cache in the menu.
Of course, memory can be optimized in many other ways. One of them is to periodically clean up the gallery manually. Moreover, at some point in time, many people discover they have several thousand photos in their WhatsApp folder, 90% of which are probably pure trash. Tip: when someone sends you an image via any chat application, try to immediately move it to a separate folder, of course, if you need it for later, and periodically delete the others from the particular folder. To make things worse, all those thousands of unnecessary photos will be uploaded to the cloud service during the next backup schedule, which can take a while. The same applies to restoring a backup when, for example, you activate a new device.
Do I even need to mention the countless unnecessary or used screenshots? You want to show someone something via screenshots, but you ignore the fact that the content remains in the device’s memory and that they only take up space. Consequently, it slows down the operation of the device when a large number of them accumulate.
TOO MANY NOTIFICATIONS
Almost every app has its notification system, and each of them wants to send as many of them to you to draw your attention. Now think about whether you need all these notifications or not. You’ve probably been in a situation where you just dismissed a notification from a less important application, but you haven’t realized that it still occupies your system resources. It is important to notice that each push notification automatically means additional background processes, additional memory load, and ultimately additional energy consumption.
In addition to distraction, notifications consume the battery, which is why their classification, or diversification, is extremely important. For starters, it’s best to set different notification sounds for different apps. Over time, you will learn the difference between WhatsApp and, for instance, e-mail sounds. It would also be good to have different sounds for different people within the chat application. In such a case, you will be able to tell the difference between your boss and a friend who is bored and bombards you with funny pictures, without even taking a look at your phone. This will help you reduce background processes, which leads to the overall improvement of your hone performance.
IGNORING THE IMPORTANCE OF REBOOTING THE PHONE
A long time ago, most of us have been turning off our phones at night, but that the case anymore. Our smartphones are constantly on, which is not a problem. They are designed for such a task, so it is not difficult for them at all.
However, each manufacturer suggests that a reset, i.e. reboot, is occasionally required. Be careful, though, This should not be confused with the hard reset function, i.e. factory reset.
It is recommended that you reset your Android mobile phone, that is, turn it off and on at least once a week. If you consider yourself an advanced user, you should be doing this more often. The reason is the accumulation of cache, various processes, and application fragments in the memory, which sometimes you cannot get rid of by solely emptying the cache or optimization applications.
CONCLUSION
Each of the above affects the device’s slowdown and unnecessary battery consumption, so there is a very high chance that you are doing some of these mistakes simultaneously. Try to get used to avoiding at least one at a time, and after a while, you’ll see that your device will run faster and your battery will last longer.
Likewise, if your device is infected with malware, a hard reset may be necessary. In this case, ensure to make a backup of only photos, contacts, and essential applications. Afterward, you should reinstall them manually.
Why?
If you use Google’s or another application backup tool, which is also offered by Android device manufacturers themselves, there is a high probability that the controversial application that brought you trouble could sneak into the backup. Many people realize this just after they go through the whole process.