How to speed up Xiaomi phone: The complete guide

Xiaomi’s modern smartphones are famous for their value for money, but even powerful flagships can slow down over time, a natural process that involves the accumulation of system debris, data fragmentation and increasing application resource requirements. Users often notice that the MIUI or HyperOS interface is slowing down and the launch of programs takes longer than when buying a device.

There are many reasons for the slowdown, from the banal overflow of storage to background processes that “eat” RAM. Fortunately, the shell from Xiaomi provides ample opportunities for optimization without the need for root rights.

In this guide, we will break down proven techniques that will help to revive even old models: you will learn how to properly clean the cache, manage autoload and use hidden developer functions for maximum acceleration.

Cleaning and optimizing memory

The first step in the fight for speed should be to audit the space occupied, where the internal storage is more than 85% full, the speed of writing and reading data critically drops, the system starts to work in a mode of scarcity of resources, which causes visible lags, you need to make room for normal virtual memory.

Use the built-in Security app, which is pre-installed on all the brand's devices, and it automatically scans the device for temporary files, remnants of remote programs, and social media cache, and cleaning it regularly through this tool is the basic maintenance procedure.

And you should pay special attention to messengers like Telegram and WhatsApp, which tend to grow to gigabytes, go to the storage settings of these apps and delete old video files that you've already viewed, which often frees up a few gigabytes, which instantly affects the performance.

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Use the Deep Clean feature in the Security app once a week to remove hidden temporary files that are not visible in standard analysis.

Remember to check the Downloads folder, which often includes APK installation files and documents you no longer need, and deleting them is the easiest way to get the system back to work.

Managing Autoboot and Background Processes

Many applications tend to run with the phone on and continue to run in the background, consuming valuable CPU resources. There is an effective tool in the MIUI shell to control this process.

To set up, go to the Apps menu and select a specific program that you rarely use. In the Battery section, set the No Limits mode for messengers only, and for the rest, select Freeze or a strict restriction on background activity, which will prevent them from working unnoticed.

It’s also worth checking the boot list. Although newer versions of Android have limited access to it, controlling through battery settings has a similar effect: Turn off running unnecessary services like app stores or news aggregators if you don’t need them every second.

Constant monitoring of running processes allows you to identify "gluttonous" applications that slow down the system even in the idle. If you notice that the phone is warming without active load, most likely, the background software is to blame.

Set up animation through the developer menu

One of the most effective ways to visually speed up a phone is to reduce the duration of the interface animations, which doesn't increase the clock speed of the processor, but it creates a sense of instantaneous response to your actions. The developer menu is hidden by default, but it's safe to activate it.

To get into the hidden settings, you need to quickly click 7 times on the build number in the About Phone section. After the message "You became a developer", a new item will appear in the settings menu, and you need to find the section associated with windows and animations.

Find the options for Windows Animation, Transition Animation, and Animation Duration. The standard value is usually 1x or 0.5x. Change them to 0.5x or even turn them off completely (0x).

Experiment with values to find a balance between smoothness and speed. For devices with high screen refresh rates (90Hz and 120Hz), completely disabling animations can make the interface twitchy, so it is better to leave the value of 0.5x.

Expanding RAM (Virtual RAM)

Xiaomi’s current models have a technology to expand physical memory by storing internal storage, called Memory Extension, which allows the system to use part of the disk as additional RAM to store background applications.

You can activate this option in the section Additional in the main settings. The system will offer you to select the amount of memory added: usually available from 2 to 4 GB. Once turned on, the phone will require a restart to apply changes.

Using virtual memory is especially important for models with 4 or 6 GB of physical RAM, which allows you to keep more applications open in the background without constantly rebooting them, but it is worth remembering that the speed of virtual memory is lower than that of real RAM.

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Enabling the memory extension is effective only if you have at least 10-15 GB of space on the internal drive, otherwise the speed of the phone, on the contrary, will fall.

If you use a UFS 3.1 fast drive, the effect will be noticeable. On older devices with slow eMMC memory, the gain can be minimal, and the wear and tear of the drive will increase.

Analysis of applications and advertising services

Embedded advertising and analytics services (MSA) also consume resources, and while it is difficult to completely disable them without losing functionality, it is possible to limit their impact. msa (MIUI System Ads) is responsible for displaying ads in system applications.

To turn off, go to password and security settings, find the Access to Personal Data section, and turn off the msa slider. The system will warn you several times about cancellation in 10 seconds - you need to wait for the timer to expire and confirm the action, this will reduce the load on the processor.

It's also worth checking out the list of high-power applications, which often include programs that you don't use very often, but are constantly active, and removing or freezing them is a surefire way to speed things up.

Comparison of optimization methods

Not all methods are equally effective for different situations. Below is a table that will help you choose an acceleration strategy depending on your problem. Some methods give an instant but short-term effect, others take time, but provide a stable result.

It's important to understand that a holistic approach is always better than a single action, and the combination of cleaning up memory and tuning animations will give you a better result than just removing applications.

As you can see from the table, factory reset is a radical but most effective way, and if software methods don't work, you should consider a complete reset with pre-retained data.

System update and resetting

Often, speed issues are related to software bugs in the current firmware version. Xiaomi regularly releases updates that contain security patches and performance optimizations. Check for updates in the About Phone section.

If the phone is slow after the upgrade, there may be a file conflict, in which case it helps to clear the cache partition through Recovery mode or a full reset.Be sure to back up all important data to the cloud or to your computer before doing this.

A full Wipe Data reset puts the phone back into a store-like state, which removes all apps, photos and settings, and after that, the phone works as fast as possible because it doesn't have any garbage accumulated over the years.

⚠️ Warning: Before performing a full reset, make sure you remember the password from the Mi Account and lock screen. Otherwise, the device may lock after rebooting (protection) FRP).

After reset, don’t rush to install hundreds of applications at once, set only the minimum necessary to assess the net performance of the system.

Frequent Questions (FAQ)