Does your iPhone seem to be running slower than usual? It’s common for your iPhone—or any phone—to become slow with time. It may indicate that it’s time to part with your existing iPhone and get a new one (after trading it in), but it’s not always the case. Cleaning out the “Other” storage on your iPhone could be the answer.
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You may already be acquainted with Other storage if you’ve ever ran out of storage and tried to manually free up space. If not, let’s first review what it is before discussing how to reduce this troublesome category.
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What is the other storage on the iPhone?
The Other area of your iPhone’s storage is a mystery catch-all. Consider it a location to store stuff like Siri voices and system files. Because of caching, it may also be a memory hog. To make programs or websites load more quickly the next time you use them, you may keep their components in your cache. When you send text messages containing images or videos, stream films or movies, or explore the web, the cache gathers stuff. Cache data in programs like Google Maps and Chrome may quickly begin to deplete your device’s storage capacity.
You must go to Settings > General > iPhone Storage in order to see how much space Other storage is using. A bar graph showing the categories using your iPhone’s storage will appear after the device has finished calculating. The gray area on the graph’s far right is often the Other storage part. Here are some actions you may do to potentially reduce the amount of space your other storage is using.
Screenshot showing the contents of the iPhone’s storage
Offloading applications you don’t use often is one of the new space-saving techniques iOS 11 brought.
Screenshot via CNET/Rick Broida
Unload applications
While offloading an app removes the program from your device, all data is saved for when you want to reinstall it. This is not the same as deleting an app. Use this tip, particularly if you have space-intensive programs like Google Maps that don’t keep a lot of data. To offload an app, return to Settings > General > iPhone Storage, press on the app you want to remove, and then choose Offload App.
Here’s a hint: An app’s storage use is shown by the number next to its name in the iPhone Storage section. You can see right once which applications are using up the most RAM or just a little amount. You may use this to determine which to outsource.
Read More: Are You Ready to Try iOS 18? Everything You Should Know About the Public Beta Is Here
Close tabs and empty the cache in Safari.
Your iPhone can be keeping data and browsing history that you don’t need if you use Safari often. Go to Settings > Safari and choose Clear History and Website Data to empty the cache in Safari. Here’s how to empty the cache in Google’s browser if you use Chrome.
Tab closure also keeps your smartphone operating smoothly and helps free up storage. By selecting Settings > Safari > Close Tabs, you may control how often Safari closes open tabs. Tabs that haven’t been visited for a day, a week, or a month may be automatically closed by Safari, or you can continue to dismiss tabs manually.
Put an end to the permanent text storage.
Your iPhone automatically saves every text message you send and receive for eternity. If you need to find a chat that happened 15 months ago, this is handy. However, if you need your storage space back, it’s not so convenient. Go to Settings and choose Messages to prevent your phone from storing messages indefinitely. Tap Keep Messages after finding Message History by scrolling down. Replace “Forever” with “30 Days” or “One Year.” If you wish to remove previous messages, a pop-up will ask; choose Delete to continue.
Reset your iPhone.
Even if you can’t clear your iPhone completely, resetting it is a reliable method to remove a large portion of the clutter in Other storage if all else fails.
See these secret iOS 17 features, iPhone settings to adjust right now, and how to make your iPhone feel more like your old Android phone for additional iPhone hints and tricks. Additionally, we provide advice on how to prolong the life of your phone before having to replace it.