Owners of Xiaomi, Redmi and POCO smartphones sooner or later face a mysterious situation: internal storage is crowded, although photos are few, and applications do not take up much space. The culprit of the celebration is often the “Other” section, which can grow to tens of gigabytes, occupying precious space. This section is a collection of system cache, residual files of deleted programs, error logs and temporary data messengers.
Not only is the accumulation of garbage in this category annoying with notifications of space shortages, but it can also significantly slow down the MIUI or HyperOS operating system. When free memory becomes critically scarce, the phone begins to "dumb", open applications longer and even freeze at the most inopportune moment. Understanding what is hiding in the bowels of the file system is the first step to solving the problem.
In this detailed guide, we will discuss safe and effective ways to clean the Others section without losing personal data. You will learn how to use embedded system tools, third-party utilities and manual methods to free up space. It is important to act consistently so that important system files necessary for a stable smartphone do not accidentally delete.
What is hidden in the “Other” section on Xiaomi
Before taking drastic action to delete files, it is important to understand the nature of this category. Android and MIUI categorize files that do not fall into the standard categories of Photos, Videos, Apps or Music as Other, most often temporary files created by apps to speed up their work.
The largest share of this section is cached data from social networks and messengers, such as Telegram, WhatsApp or Viber, which stores images, videos and documents you have viewed in cache so that when you reopen the chat, they download instantly, and over time this cache can grow to 10-20 GB, leaving the user unnoticed until he decides to check the storage.
In addition, the “Other” shall contain:
- 📱 Residual files after deleting applications (folders with settings, logs).
- 📦 Offline maps of navigators and downloaded tracks.
- 📝 System Logs and Error Reports.
- 🎵 Temporary files of browsers and streaming services.
⚠️ Note: Not all files in the Other section are garbage; some may contain game progress or application-specific configurations; blindly deleting the contents of system folders can cause software malfunctions.
Why is the Other section growing faster than other brands?
Use of the built-in "Security" application
The easiest and safest way to start cleaning up is to use Xiaomi’s regular tool, which is pre-installed on every device in the brand and can find obvious garbage quite efficiently, scanning the system for residual files, ad cache and duplicates.
To start the cleaning process, you need to open the application, select the "Clean" item and wait for the scan to end. The system will suggest removing files that it considers safe to delete. However, it is worth noting that a standard scanner is often too conservative and does not see the deep cache of messengers, which makes up the lion's share of the "Other" section.
To access more detailed settings, follow the following steps:
- Open the Security app.
- Go to the Cleanup section.
- Click on the Garbage icon or Files at the bottom of the screen.
- Select the category "Large files" or "Recent" for manual analysis.
☑️ Quick cleaning algorithm
If the volume of the Other partition has decreased slightly after a standard cleaning, then you should not despair, which means that the bulk of the data is hidden in the cache of specific applications, where a standard scanner does not look without deep analysis, in which case manual intervention or the use of more advanced analysis tools will be required.
Cleaning the cache of messengers and social networks
As mentioned, the main memory eaters are messengers. Telegram, WhatsApp, Viber and social networks store huge amounts of media files. To remove them from the Other section, it is not enough to simply clear the cache through the Android settings, since this can unlog you in the application.
Consider the example of Telegram, which is famous for its voracious appetite for memory:
- 🚀 Open Telegram and go to Settings.
- Select Data and Memory.
- Press Memory Use.
- Click "Clear Telegram cache."
It's important to note that clearing the messenger cache doesn't delete your correspondence and important files if they're stored in the cloud. When you reopen the chat, a photo or video will be re-uploaded from the network, and it's the most efficient way to free up gigabytes of space without the risk of losing data.
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In the Telegram and WhatsApp settings, you can set automatic cache clearing (for example, once every 3 days or week) to prevent future growth of the “Other” section.
WhatsApp has a slightly different procedure, because it often has cache in shared folders. Go to Settings → Data and Storage → Storage Management. You can see which chats are taking up the most space, and delete media files selectively or entirely, allowing you to pinpoint the "heavy" videos you've already viewed and don't need.
Manual removal through Explorer and folder analysis
If the automatic methods don't work, you'll have to do manual file system analysis, and Xiaomi has Explorer built in to do that, and it lets you see folder structure and find forgotten downloads or remnants of deleted games, and be careful to only delete the one you're 100% sure of.
First of all, look at the Download folder. Often users download APK installation files, documents or archives that become useless ballast after use. Also worth checking the DCIM →.thumbnails folder. This is a hidden folder with sketches of photos; if you deleted a lot of photos, but the space did not vacate, this cache may have grown.
Table of the main folders that can be cleaned:
| folder | Description of the contents | Security of removal |
|---|---|---|
| Download | Files downloaded from the browser | High (check files) |
| MIUI/debug_log | Logs of system debugging | Tall. |
| Android/obb | Heavy gaming cache (data) | Average (there will be no progress in games) |
| Temp | Temporary application files | Tall. |
When you delete files from your Android/obb or Android/data folder, remember that you delete the cache of games and applications. If you delete files from there, the game may require you to re-download resources the next time you run.This is secure for the system, but requires the Internet to recover data.
Reset application settings and clean up data
Sometimes a particular application starts to behave incorrectly and generate a huge number of erroneous logs, inflating the "Other" section, in which case forced cleaning of the data of a particular application helps, which will return the program to the "post-installation" state by deleting all its settings and local files.
To perform this operation:
- Go to the phone settings.
- Go to the Appendix section → All Appendices.
- Find a problem application (often browsers or social networks).
- Press Memory and select "Clear" (or "Reset").
⚠️ Warning: The Clear Data button removes the authorization in the app. You'll have to re-enter your login and password. Make sure you remember your credentials before resetting.
This method is particularly effective for browsers (Chrome, Yandex), which can accumulate gigabytes of temporary files. Once reset, the browser will become “clean”, without history, passwords (if they are not synchronized with a Google account) and cache. For system applications such as “Gallery” or “Conductor”, the data reset is also safe and often solves problems with the interface freeze.
Cardinal measures: Reset to factory settings
If none of the above methods helped reduce the volume of the Other partition and it continues to occupy an absurd volume (for example, 40-50 GB on an empty phone), there may have been a file system error or the accumulation of system debris has reached a critical level, in which case the only reliable solution is a complete reset to factory settings (Hard Reset).
This procedure will completely remove all data from the device, including contacts, photos, apps and settings. The phone will return to the “out of the box” state. Before starting, be sure to back up important data to the Mi Cloud cloud or to your computer.
Procedure for discharge:
- 🔒 Go to Settings. → The phone.
- Press Resetting.
- Choose to erase all data.
- Confirm the action with the unlock password.
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A complete reset is the only way to ensure that system debris is removed that is not visible to the user and is not removed by regular cleaning tools.
Once you reboot, you'll get a clean system. The Other section will be minimal. It's also a great opportunity to start using your phone from scratch without installing years of accumulated digital junk. If the Other partition takes up a lot of space after a reset (over 5-7 GB on a clean system), this may indicate a hardware problem with flash memory or a serious firmware bug that requires flashing through your computer.
Prevention: How to prevent the growth of garbage
To avoid the problem of overcrowded memory in the future, there are a few good habits to adopt: Regular digital hygiene prolongs the life of a smartphone and keeps it fast. MIUI can do a lot of things automatically, but user control is still necessary.
It is recommended to check the Downloads folder once a month and delete unnecessary files, and it is also worth turning off auto-save the received media to the gallery in the messenger settings if you do not want every funny video from the chats to take up space in memory. Use cloud storage for photos and videos, activating the "Free space" function, which deletes the originals from the device after downloading to the cloud.
By following these simple rules, your Xiaomi will be able to run fast and consistently for years to come. Memory is a resource to be cherished, and now you know all the effective ways to manage it.