Xiaomi and Redmi smartphone owners often face a situation where images appear fuzzy first when viewing a gallery and then slowly gain sharpness. This effect, known as thumbnail blur, can be very annoying, especially if you are used to instant interface response. The problem is not always in the weak hardware, but in the peculiarities of optimizing the MIUI shell or HyperOS when working with media files.
Android uses a special cache for sketches to avoid wasting CPU resources on constantly processing full-size photos. However, on Xiaomi devices, this mechanism sometimes fails, causing rendering delays. In this article, we will discuss in detail why this happens, how to set up the gallery for maximum speed, and what hidden features can help solve the problem.
Mechanism of work of the sketch cache in MIUI
Understanding how the operating system processes images is the first step to solving this problem, and when you take a picture, the camera saves the file in high resolution, but it creates a smaller copy to show it in the grid of the gallery. That's the thumbnail. If the system can't find or make that copy quickly, you see a blurred spot that gradually becomes clear.
In MIUI and HyperOS, the hidden Thumbnails folder is responsible for this process. The system algorithms try to balance the display quality with the speed of operation. The critical factor here is the filling of internal memory: when space is scarce, the system does not physically have time to generate new sketches in the background.
In addition, the modern AI algorithms at Xiaomi Gallery are trying to improve the quality of previews on the fly, which adds to the load on the processor. This often leads to the fact that when you flip through the tape of the photo you see a porridge of pixels, which clears up only a second later.
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Use the “Dark Theme” mode in the gallery – it not only saves your eyes, but also reduces the load on the gallery. AMOLED-screens, saving battery power when viewing a photo.
It's worth noting that the problem can be software-based, and system updates sometimes change how com.miui.gallery handles media, so it's important to keep track of the application version and the firmware itself.
The main reasons for blurring and gallery lags
There are several key factors that affect how quickly images are rendered, and most of the time, users are faced with a combination of these causes, which makes the problem more pronounced. Let's take a closer look at them to see which one is relevant for you.
- 📉 Cache overflow: Old sketches take up space and interfere with the creation of new ones, causing conflicts when reading data.
- 📸 High resolution images: 108 MP or RAW They take longer to process previews than standard ones. JPEG.
- 🔄 Cloud Sync: If Xiaomi Cloud or Google Photos is enabled, the system may try to download thumbnails from the network rather than from memory.
- 💾 Lack of RAM: Aggressive Memory Management in the MIUI It can unload gallery processes, causing them to restart at each opening.
Special attention should be paid to the file system, because if you delete and write large amounts of data often, fragmentation of memory can slow down access to thumbnail files, in which case even a powerful processor will not save you from delays.
The number of media files also affects, because smartphone owners with a memory card or a large amount of built-in storage that stores tens of thousands of photos notice the problem more often, and the system simply does not have time to index the entire data array instantly.
Cleaning the cache and resetting the gallery settings
The most effective and safest way to solve the problem is to force the cleaning of the accumulated data of the application. This will not delete your photos, but reset the display settings and clear temporary files that may have been corrupted.
To do this, you need to go to the system settings. Find the Apps section, then select All Apps. Find the standard Xiaomi gallery in the list. Click on Clear and select Clear Cache. If that doesn't work, you can try Clear Everything, but then you'll reset your album and favorites settings.
☑️ Checklist for data cleanup
Once cleaned, the system will start the re-indexing process, and in the first minutes of operation, the gallery can run slower than usual, because the processor will re-create the sketches for all the photos, which is normal behavior that will pass in 10-15 minutes of active use.
⚠️ Warning: If you decide to use third-party garbage cleaner utilities (like Clean Master), be careful.They can delete system thumbnail files, which will result in the preview disappearing completely before the next reboot or manual database reassembly.
It is also important to check whether memory saving is enabled for this application.Some versions of HyperOS have a setting that limits the background activity of the gallery, which paradoxically can worsen the speed of downloading previews when returning to the application.
Optimization of storage and work with media files
Free disk space is a critical performance parameter for Xiaomi Redmi. When more than 85% of the internal memory is filled, the speed of writing and reading decreases, which directly affects the generation of thumbnails.
It is recommended to delete unnecessary videos and screenshots regularly, and it is also worth checking the DCIM/.thumbnails folder (available through the file manager when displaying hidden files). If the file in this folder weighs several gigabytes, it can be safely deleted - the system will create a new, more optimized one.
The use of a microSD card also has its nuances: If the gallery is set to display a photo from the card, and the card itself has a low read speed (class 4 or 6), the blur will be a permanent companion, in such cases it is better to transfer media files to internal storage or replace the card with a faster one (UHS-I or UHS-II).
| Type of memory | Reading speed (min) | Impact on miniatures | Recommendation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Internal (UFS 2.2) | Tall. | Minimum | Optimally. |
| SD card (Class 10) | Medium | Notable delay | Permissible. |
| SD card (Class 4) | Low. | A lot of blur. | Replace |
| Overflowing memory | Critical | Lags and hangs | Clean up |
Secret code for memory checks
Keep in mind that cloud services also take up cache space. If you use Google Photos with Free Space, make sure local thumbnail copies don’t conflict with cloud data.
Hidden developer settings and experiments
For advanced users, Android provides access to hidden menus where you can tweak graphics options. Enabling developer options allows you to rescale the interface and speed up animations, which visually makes downloading thumbnails faster.
Go to Settings → About Phone and 7 times click on the build number. Then, in the Advanced Settings menu → For developers, find the Drawing section. Here you can change or disable window animations. Although this will not speed up the process of decoding JPEG, the interface will be more responsive.
There is also the possibility of forced use. GPU rendering 2D-This option is in the same developer menu. On the weak Redmi models, this can give you performance gains, but it can increase battery consumption.
⚠️ Attention: Changing the settings in the Developer Menu can cause system instability. Write down your changes to get things back to normal if necessary. Don't turn off system processes you're not sure about.
Some users recommend turning off the photo enhancement feature in the gallery settings if this option is present in your version of MIUI. This will remove the extra post-processing of the real-time preview.
Alternative solutions and third-party software
If the standard Xiaomi gallery continues to run slowly even after all the settings, it makes sense to consider alternatives.The app store offers a plethora of optimized solutions that can run faster than stock.
- 🖼️ Google Photos: It does a great job of caching and has smart search, but requires a Google account.
- 🚀 QuickPic Mod: Lightweight, fast ad-free gallery, perfect for older devices.
- 🎨 F-Stop Gallery: A professional tool with powerful sorting and caching capabilities.
Third-party software is especially relevant for the Redmi A or Redmi Go budget models, where system resources are limited, and these applications often ignore the heavy shell effects and work directly with the file system.
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If the blur problem persists on all applications, it may be the hardware degradation of the drive or the need to flash the device.
You can also try to disable automatic thumbnail updates in the battery settings for the gallery app, allowing background activity, which will give the system the right to preview while you are watching the previous photo.