Owners of budget smartphones like the Xiaomi Redmi 9A often face a nasty situation: the device’s internal memory fills up, even though the user hasn’t installed new apps or taken many photos. The system analyzer (storage) has a mysterious section called “Other” that can take from 2 to 10 gigabytes.
This system folder stores temporary files, remnants of remote programs, messenger cache and system logs that were not automatically deleted by the operating system. Understanding the nature of this data is critical to maintaining MIUI performance, as a crowded drive leads to interface lags and camera slow operation.
In this article, we will take a closer look at the structure of this section, explain why it grows over time, and provide a step-by-step algorithm for securely clearing without losing personal data.
The Nature of the Other Section in the Android Operating System
The Other section is not a virus or bug, but a standard Android file system mechanism. When an application creates temporary files for its work, it marks them as cache. However, unless the developer has prescribed a rule to automatically delete these files after completing a task, they remain dead weight.
Over time, these files accumulate in large numbers, which may contain previews of images from a gallery, thumbnails of videos from social networks, fragments of web pages and geolocation data, and Redmi 9A sees these files, but can not uniquely classify them as Photos, Videos or Applications, so it classifies them as Other.
Pay special attention to messengers: WhatsApp, Telegram and Viber store all received media files in their own hidden directories. For the system it is just a set of bytes in an unknown partition, and for the user - gigabytes of occupied space.
Main sources of memory filling on Redmi 9A
The most active users of the space in the Other section are social networks and streaming services. Every time you flip through an Instagram feed or watch a story on TikTok, the content is uploaded to cache. Even if you don't save a photo, it already occupies space on the disk.
The second source is system logs and error reports. If an application is unstable, MIUI can record a detailed crash report. Under normal conditions, these files weigh kilobytes, but if a cyclic error occurs, the log file can grow to gigabytes.
Remnants of remote games are also included, and often after removing a heavy application with a Unity or Unreal Engine, cache files (.obb files or cache data) remain on the disk that the system does not automatically delete.
- 📱 Messenger cache: voice messages, stickers and uploaded videos.
- 📺 Streaming buffers: temporary files of YouTube, Netflix and online cinemas.
- 🗑️ Residual files: data from remote applications and games.
- 📝 System Logs: Error logs and telemetry reports.
⚠️ Before drastically cleaning the Other section, make sure you have a backup of important data, as some system files may be required to function properly for individual functions after a reset.
Standard cleaning methods through MIUI settings
The safest way to free up space is to use Xiaomi's built-in tools. The MIUI shell has a powerful system cleaner that can find junk files. Go to Security to run and select Cleanup.
Once scanned, the system will suggest removing temporary files. However, standard cleaning is often superficial. To get to the deep sections of "Other", you need to go to the storage settings. Go to Settings → About Phone → Memory.
Here you'll see a detailed usage chart. Clicking on the "Other" section won't always be able to delete files directly, but the system can tell you which apps occupy the most space in this section. It's often helpful to click the "Clear Guidelines" button that the system itself offers.
Don't ignore the Deep Clean feature in the standard app, which analyzes similar photos, large files, and long-overdue applications, and helps to reveal hidden amounts of data that are not visible visually in normal mode.
Manual cleaning through the Conductor and Analyzer
For more advanced users, manual cleaning is available. MIUI → debug_log And debugging logs are often accumulated. If you're not a developer and you're not debugging apps, this folder can be safely cleaned. The files here are either.log or.txt.
It's also worth checking the Android → data folder. It stores app data. It's risky to delete entire folders here, because you can reset your game progress or program settings. You'd better go inside your messenger folders (like com.whatsapp) and delete only the media or cache subfolders.
Use the built-in Explorer app. Enable the display of hidden files in the Explorer settings (three dots in the corner → Settings → Hidden files). This will allow you to see folders starting from a dot, which are often cache storage.
☑️ Checklist for manual cleaning
Pay special attention to the Download folder. Often, APK installation files are downloaded there, which are no longer needed after installing applications, but continue to occupy space in the “Other” or “Applications” section.
Using third-party utilities to analyze the disk
If standard tools don't help visualize the problem, specialized tools come to the rescue, and applications like DiskUsage or Files by Google build a visual memory card where the square size corresponds to the file size.
With these programs, you can instantly find a parasite file that weighs several gigabytes, which can be a forgotten movie, an archive, or a corrupted database file. DiskUsage is especially good because it shows the folder hierarchy in a visual diagram.
In newer versions of Android (11 and above), access to the Android/data folder may be limited, but basic cleaning will work.
| Cleaning method | Efficiency | Risk of data loss | Difficulty |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard MIUI cleaning | Low. | No. | Low. |
| Cleaning up the app cache | Medium | Minimum | Low. |
| Manual deletion of files | Tall. | Medium. | Medium |
| Reset to factory settings | Maximum | Total loss. | Tall. |
⚠️ Note: When using third-party disk analyzers, never delete system files with names that contain “system,” “framework,” or “vendor,” this can cause your phone to reboot cyclically.
Radical method: Reset to factory settings
If the Other partition takes up a critical amount (e.g., more than 50% of memory) and is not cleanable, the only way out is a complete reset, which will return Redmi 9A to a store-like state. All data will be deleted, so you must back up to your computer or the cloud.
To perform the reset, go to Settings → About Phone → Settings Reset → Erase all data. The process will take about 10-15 minutes. Once turned on, the phone will be clean, and the Other section will occupy the minimum system volume required.
This method is also useful if the phone is slow, not only because of memory shortages, but also because of software errors accumulated over the years of use, a "nuclear" variant that solves 99% of software memory problems.
What if the memory is filled immediately after resetting?
Preventing overcrowding of storage
To keep the problem from returning, you need to change your smartphone usage habits. Check your messaging settings regularly. WhatsApp and Telegram can turn off auto-save media to the gallery, which will prevent duplicate files from being created.
Use cloud storage (Google Photos, Yandex.Disk) with auto-delete from the device after download, this will keep local memory free, it is also useful once a month to go through the Settings → Applications path and clean the cache of the most difficult programs.
Do not install applications from unverified sources. APK-files often contain advertising modules that generate a huge number of junk files in the background, inflating the Other section».
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Turn on the “Notify of filling” function in the “Memory” settings so that the system warns you in advance when the free space will run out.
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Regular prevention and control of application rights is more effective than periodic fight against the consequences of overcrowded memory.