How To Empty Trash On Android

One of the most disturbing messages you can get from your phone is that its storage is full. A full storage can affect the normal operation of apps and processes of your device. Even after deleting videos, photos, apps and some files, this message still shows. I will show you how to empty trash on your Android device and generally gain more space.

Where is the trash bin located?

Unlike PCs and Macs, there’s no designated folder or application where deleted apps are stored either permanently or temporarily. There are however some apps that have their own trash for files deleted within the app. Google photos, Gmail are popular apps with this feature.

How To Clear Trash On Google Photos

The Google photos app has a trash can where photos or videos sent there remain there and get removed automatically after 60 days. If you must empty the trash, follow these steps to do so.

• Open photos app
• Select library
• At the top of the screen select bin. All photos and videos deleted within the last 60 days would l be displayed.
• Tap select or long press one photo and check the photos or videos you want to remove from trash
• Tap delete

How To Delete Photos Or Videos Without Going To Trash

If you do not want to go through the process of deleting files from the trash bin, you should delete them using this method.

• Open photos
• Open Library and folder the photos or videos are located
• Tap and hold on a photo. You will now be able to check photos or videos you want to delete.
• After selecting them, tap on the menu button and select delete from device.

Doing this will permanently remove the files from the phone without first sending it to trash. 

How To Clear Trash Can of Gmail 

Gmail is one of the apps that has its own trash can where deleted emails are sent to for 30 days and are automatically deleted after 30 days. To empty trash on Gmail, do this. 

• Open Gmail app. 
• Open the menu and select bin. All deleted emails will be shown there. 
• Tap ok empty bin now and select empty.

How To Empty Trash On Samsung Device

On Samsung devices running Android pie 9.0 and later have a built-in trash for gallery. The trash feature works the same way as the trash can in Google photos. Follow these steps to activate trash on Samsung gallery. 

• Open the gallery app
• Open menu by tapping other three dots at the upper corner of the screen or the menu at the bottom depending on the android version
• Tap on trash and select ‘turn on trash’

One major reason for emptying trash is to free up space and since there is nothing like a trash bin on Android aside from the ones that come with specific apps, we will now look at ways to free up phone space.

We will be looking at five ways to clear trash and free space. They are:

• Clear cached data
• Uninstall unused apps
• Remove redundant apps
• Store files on micro SD card
• Delete Junk files

Clear Cached Data 

Cached data are files, scripts, images or other multimedia files stored on your phone when you open an app or website for the first time. Cache data are important because they help to reduce load time for the next time you open the app or Website. 

So when you open an app or website the next time, the data quickly gathers information and therefore the app or website will open faster. We will look at clearing cache data for a browser (Chrome) and apps.

Clear Cache in Chrome App

• Open Chrome app
• Open the menu by tapping on the three dot icon
• Select History, then clear browsing data
• Select cached images and files
• Tap the clear data button to clear cache

Clear Cache of Phone Apps

• Open settings
• Select storage
• Select internal storage
• Tap cached data 
• Select ok on the dialogue box

Clear Cache of One Phone App

• On the home screen, tap and hold on the icon of the app you want to clear its cache
• Tap on app info 
• On the page that opens, select storage
• Now tap on the clear cache button

NOTE: Clearing an app’s cache does not delete the data of the app.

Uninstall Unused Apps

You may have realized that there are some apps on your phone you have never opened.  You may have downloaded them earlier for a reason or by accident but now you don’t use them. Either which way, you can delete the app and use the space for something else.

Simply tap and hold the app’s icon and select app info. A page with an uninstall button will show. Tap on it to uninstall the app. You can also tap and drag the app’s icon to the bin that will appear at the top or bottom of your screen depending on your phone. Select ok. The app will be uninstalled. 

Remove Redundant Files 

Duplicates of photos, videos and documents tend to take up space on our phones. If you are a college student like myself who receives flyers, Ad photos and videos and educational documents and files, you would absolutely relate to this. You can go through your phone and look at for redundant files and delete them. 

You can also download third-party apps for detecting and deleting duplicate files. You can simply type “duplicate file remover” on the search box of Google play and download a duplicate file remover.

Store Files on a Micro SD Card

If you have files that you must keep but the size of your phone’s internal storage would not permit you, then consider saving your files on a Micro SD card. Most Android phones have a slot for SD cards.

You can simply insert the SD card on the slot and make the necessary settings to fully utilize the card. Check out how to use an SD card as default storage.

Delete Junk Files 

When you perform a task or action or a command, temporary files are stored on your device. These files are known as junk files. Junk Files are only useful at the time the action is being carried out and after they are useless and just take up space.

Deleting Junk Files will give you more storage and no function of your Android Phone will be affected. 

• Open Files by Google
• Tap clean at the bottom left
• Tap confirm and free up on the junk files card
• Select ‘see junk files’
• Select the temporary app files you want to delete
• Tap clear
• Tap clear on the confirmation message