Is your phone acting up on you? If your Android device is a bit long in the tooth, sometimes you’ll notice it starting to lag, crash, or open apps that you didn’t mean to open — y’know, typical Android problems. Now this isn’t because your phone has a virus or needs to be replaced, It could be that you just have too much information on it, unnecessary information.  So, if you’re noticing your apps are sluggish, that’s when you know it’s time to clean up the cached data. How do you do that? Good question! Let’s get started by showing you how it’s done, shall we?

Clearing Your App Cache

When you start to use an application, you may not notice but they’ll start to store files in your app for reference. They’ll save files that could be images or text that you’ve already read so that they don’t have to re-download this information again. Basically, this is meant to save time when you open your app. This information is stored in an app’s cache file. You don’t have to do this weekly, you can allow some time to pass before you do it again. Remember, each time you do this, it’s removing your stored data, so it’ll have to download this information again when your app needs to reference this information. For example, if you remove Google Maps caches data, the addresses you’ve search previously will all be deleted. So, you’ll have to re-enter this information into Google Maps again.

Nevertheless, in order to do this, it’s quite easy and you’ll be able to gain some space that was being used by cached data.

Go into Settings on your Android, once in Settings, scroll down until you find Apps. Tap on Apps. You’ll notice that it’ll show you every single app you have on your Android. Now, you can tap on an app of your choice, where it’ll bring you to a screen which provides you information on that specific app. Now, it varies for each Android, however, for many, if you tap on storage, it’ll take you to another screen where you’ll see cache. Underneath of cache, you’ll see Clear Cache, tap on it. Then, you’ll have clear the cached data from the app. You can go back, click on another app and follow the same procedure.

Clearing App Data or Resetting an App

Now clearing app data is more intense than just clearing cache. By doing this, you’re also clearing any settings that have been made with that app. Essentially, you’re choosing to start all over again, as if you just downloaded this app – it’ll be brand new. You do this as the last restore. Perhaps after clearing cache, your phone is still lagging, if so, then you should do this.

In order to do this, you’re going to go into settings. Once in settings, scroll down until you find Apps. Tap on Apps.  It’s essentially the same way you’d access cache. Again, you’ll notice that it’ll show you every single app you have on your Android. Now, you can tap on an app of your choice, where it’ll bring you to a screen which provides you information on that specific app. Now, it varies for each Android, however, for many, if you tap on storage, once in storage, you’ll see the option clear data. Tap on clear data. It’ll clear all your apps data.

Now, you need to open the app and sign in and/or proceed with essentially reinstalling it since you won’t have any old data on it. Once you have the app up and running, see if the problems you had with it are fixed. Whether it fixes the problem or not, you should contact the developer of the app and alert them of what your problem is. They’ll be happy to hear this information for when they’re making upgrades to the app. Plus, they may be able to give you suggestions on what went wrong and what can be done.

Remember, clear your cache data when you feel your phone is acting weird and/or sluggish. If your app is really bugging out, then clear its data and start from scratch. If none of these work, contact the developer.