Phone Getting Slow

[Computernaut]

Lately I've noticed that my phone has been slowing down and becoming less responsive, it's not an expensive or fancy phone (Motorola Moto E5 Play), but it used to be better. Opening and closing things is more sluggish and switching between tasks too. My friend also has a Motorola phone (a much older one than mine) and he has also been experiencing slow-downs, his are much worse than mine. It makes sense that his phone would be getting slower as it gets old, but mine is only a couple years old. Any ideas why this could be happening?

[Shimejii]

Multiple factors go into the phone getting slow. Battery life starts to go, which the phone auto adjusts the amount of power it can allow, so it will start to slow the CPU down over time.

 

Bloated software on the Storage drive, eventually if you dont keep things clean, restarting the phone every day, occasionally full reset can help, but generally phones get bloated and slow down, as per the design, they make them become obsolete.

[Computernaut]

14 minutes ago, Shimejii said:

Multiple factors go into the phone getting slow. Battery life starts to go, which the phone auto adjusts the amount of power it can allow, so it will start to slow the CPU down over time.

 

Bloated software on the Storage drive, eventually if you dont keep things clean, restarting the phone every day, occasionally full reset can help, but generally phones get bloated and slow down, as per the design, they make them become obsolete.

I haven't even had this phone for a year yet! I'll try a disk cleanup (or whatever they call it on Android) though.

[SupaKomputa]

Phone companies deliberately makes the phone slower on each update so your phone will feel outdated when new products released.

They push some added features, but in turn make the phone load more junks in the background.

On the other hand the updates also give you a better stability and security.

Apps also will need more resources everytime it is updated, usually this will tax your memory.

Just like in PC when memory is full, the system will automatically move the less important one to the storage.

And since the storage is slower than the memory, when this happens you will feel slowness.

[Commodus]

16 hours ago, SupaKomputa said:

Phone companies deliberately makes the phone slower on each update so your phone will feel outdated when new products released.

They push some added features, but in turn make the phone load more junks in the background.

On the other hand the updates also give you a better stability and security.

Apps also will need more resources everytime it is updated, usually this will tax your memory.

Just like in PC when memory is full, the system will automatically move the less important one to the storage.

And since the storage is slower than the memory, when this happens you will feel slowness.

I'm sorry, but this "they're doing this just to slow your phone down" assertion is unsupported by evidence.  They do add more features that eventually weigh things down, but they're not Snidely Whiplash-style villains who arbitrarily insert code to make your phone sluggish.  Hell, Apple has made a point of improving performance on older phones as of late... my parents' iPhone 6 units were speedy enough until they jumped to the iPhone 11!

 

The boring, far likelier answer is that they want to keep adding features to give people (newcomers and veterans alike) reasons to buy their new phones, and sometimes those upgrades weigh things down.  I'd add that some vendors, like Samsung, are notorious for simply being bad at optimizing for older devices.

[Guest]

On 1/15/2020 at 10:34 PM, Computernaut said:

Lately I've noticed that my phone has been slowing down and becoming less responsive, it's not an expensive or fancy phone (Motorola Moto E5 Play), but it used to be better. Opening and closing things is more sluggish and switching between tasks too. My friend also has a Motorola phone (a much older one than mine) and he has also been experiencing slow-downs, his are much worse than mine. It makes sense that his phone would be getting slower as it gets old, but mine is only a couple years old. Any ideas why this could be happening?

As others have already stated, a full reset is usually a good idea and will likely improve your situation. I'm a little paranoid and do my phone every six months to keep it 'fresh', but I'd recommend at least annually. Also, go through your phone line by line, app by app, and really see what you use and don't use. Uninstall, disable, limit and prune as many settings and apps as you can. A factory install turns on A LOT of settings most people don't need and usually installs bloatware by default so be on the lookout for that.

 

Phones do get a little slower as they age but it can be mitigated with proper care and taking some initiative. I've had phones that were three and four years old but were just as snappy as the day I bought them. Bear in mind also that major Android updates are sometimes poorly optimized for older hardware and can strain your phone, which is pretty much out of your control unless you refuse to update. Good luck!

[Computernaut]

1 hour ago, Stylized_Violence said:

Also, go through your phone line by line, app by app, and really see what you use and don't use. Uninstall, disable, limit and prune as many settings and apps as you can. A factory install turns on A LOT of settings most people don't need and usually installs bloatware by default so be on the lookout for that.

I've already been through the Settings app carefully and check that everything is the way I like it (I do this for all my electronics) and I've done what I can to mitigate the effects of the bloatware, most of which I can't uninstall. The settings are pretty bare so there's not too much I can do, my other phone (an LG) was better in terms of options.

[Guest]

4 hours ago, Computernaut said:

I've already been through the Settings app carefully and check that everything is the way I like it (I do this for all my electronics) and I've done what I can to mitigate the effects of the bloatware, most of which I can't uninstall. The settings are pretty bare so there's not too much I can do, my other phone (an LG) was better in terms of options.

Well good deal then, you're halfway there. If all that is cleaned up as best you can, and the phone is still much slower than when you got it, then a full factory reset might be your last option. But even there, bear in mind that even by 2018 standards (the phone's release year), it's specs are below midrange so I'm not sure how snappy or fast it was to begin with. Not trying to be a dick, just stating a fact. I mean it's got 2GB of RAM which doesn't allow a whole lot of multitasking and a Snapdragn 4xx series chipset.

 

Let me ask you this: have you upgraded past Oreo? 

[Computernaut]

11 hours ago, Stylized_Violence said:

Well good deal then, you're halfway there. If all that is cleaned up as best you can, and the phone is still much slower than when you got it, then a full factory reset might be your last option. But even there, bear in mind that even by 2018 standards (the phone's release year), it's specs are below midrange so I'm not sure how snappy or fast it was to begin with. Not trying to be a dick, just stating a fact. I mean it's got 2GB of RAM which doesn't allow a whole lot of multitasking and a Snapdragn 4xx series chipset.

 

Let me ask you this: have you upgraded past Oreo? 

I'm aware that the phone was slow to begin with (you should see it try to auto-rotate) and I do virtually no multi-tasking, so it's not too big of a deal. The phone has gotten a bit bit better lately (I'm not sure why).

 

To my knowledge Motorola has not issued an OS upgrade, so I'm still on Oreo. I can see if they have though.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Computernaut said:

I'm aware that the phone was slow to begin with (you should see it try to auto-rotate) and I do virtually no multi-tasking, so it's not too big of a deal. The phone has gotten a bit bit better lately (I'm not sure why).

 

To my knowledge Motorola has not issued an OS upgrade, so I'm still on Oreo. I can see if they have though.

Huh, a mystery then. Well best of luck then dude/dudette, maybe someone else has some ideas for ya.