How to Clean RAM on Xiaomi Phone: The Complete Guide

Modern smartphones in the Xiaomi, Redmi and POCO line, which are based on MIUI or HyperOS shells, have powerful hardware, but over time users may notice a slowdown in the interface. This is often due to overflow of RAM, which is responsible for storing temporary data of running applications and system processes. When free space in RAM ends, the device begins to forcibly close background tasks, which leads to constant reboot of programs and “lags”.

Unlike computers, where memory cleaning often requires third-party software, the Android ecosystem and specifically the shell from the Chinese manufacturer built effective tools for manual management of resources. Proper use of these tools allows you to extend battery life and ensure smooth animations even on budget models with 4 or 6 gigabytes of memory.

Next, we’ll explore not only standard methods for freeing up resources through a cleaner, but also more advanced techniques, including hidden developer settings and memory extension management. Understanding how Android works will help you keep your gadget in perfect condition without having to install questionable optimizer utilities.

Standard cleaning method through the Security application

The easiest and most affordable way to free up resources is to use the regular Security app, which is preinstalled on every device of the brand. This tool is integrated deep into the system and has the necessary rights to force the closure of processes that cannot be stopped by a regular swipe. To start the procedure, you need to open the application, wait for the completion of the automatic scan and press the Memory Cleanup or Clean up button in the corresponding block.

Once you press a button, the system will force the background applications that consume the most resources, and it's important to understand that this is a temporary solution: Android is designed so that free memory is wasteful, so the system will quickly fill the vacant space with newly launched services. However, such a preventive measure can be extremely useful for running heavy games or camera-intensive tasks.

It’s worth noting that in newer firmware versions, the cleaner algorithm has become more aggressive, not only closing applications, but also clearing the cache of system services that may have swelled due to bugs in the code of individual programs, and using this feature regularly (once every few days) helps keep the interface running smoothly.

• 🚀 Open the Security app on the home screen.
• 🚀 Click on the Clean button or go to Accelerate section.
• 🚀 Wait for the analysis to be finished and press the large cleaning button.
• 🚀 Check the result in the window with a pie chart that appears.

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Use the memory clearing widget on your desktop for quick access without going into the app menu.

Expanding RAM: Memory Extension Technology

Owners of devices with relatively little physical memory (4 or 6 GB) can use Memory Extension, which allows them to reserve a portion of embedded storage (ROM) and use it as virtual RAM, and when physical RAM is full, the system automatically transfers less active processes to this reserved buffer, preventing important applications from being unloaded from the background.

The way to activate this function is through the settings menu. The path usually looks like: Settings → Additional settings → Expansion of memory. Here you can choose the amount of memory you add: 2, 3 or 4 GB is usually available depending on the free space on the disk. After choosing the volume, you will need to restart the device for the changes to take effect.

⚠️ Attention: Using memory extensions increases the load on the built-in drive. On older or badly worn smartphone models, this can theoretically accelerate the wear of flash memory, although modern controllers UFS They handle such loads well.

The effectiveness of this feature varies depending on the use cases. If you keep dozens of tabs open in your browser or constantly switch between heavy games and messengers, expanding memory will give a tangible increase in performance. In ordinary household tasks, the difference may not be so noticeable, but the background work of messengers will become more stable.

Settings for developers: management of background processes

To fine-tune the behavior of the system, you can use the hidden Developer Menu, which is a tool that allows you to severely limit the number of processes that Android has the right to keep in memory, a radical method that is useful if the phone is slow even after resetting.

To get to the menu, you need to click on the build number several times in the About Phone section until the developer mode notification appears. Next, in the Additional Settings section → For developers, we are interested in the Background Process Limit. By default, there is a “Standard Limit”, but you can choose the option “No More than 2 processes” or “No background processes”.

Changing this parameter causes the system to aggressively kill applications immediately after folding. On the one hand, it frees up maximum RAM for the active application. On the other hand, you lose multitasking: notifications can come with a delay, and music in the player can stop when switching to a map.

• 🔧 Activate the Developer Mode by pressing 7 once-over MIUI/HyperOS.
• 🔧 Find the section for developers in the system settings.
• 🔧 Go to the Applications block and select the Background Process Limit.
• 🔧 Set a limit (recommended no more) 3-4 processes»).

If you don't understand what a particular process is for, you'd better leave the standard values. The com.android.systemui system process is critical to the interface, and its forced termination through ADB or other means will lead to a reboot of the graphics shell.

Memory usage analysis and resource “eaters” search

Before you start a mass cleanup, you need to understand what your Xiaomi is using, because the built-in analyzer allows you to see detailed statistics for each application, and it often turns out that the lion's share of memory is not occupied by games, but by social networks or poorly optimized services.

In the Settings → Memory menu (or through the Security app), you can see the RAM usage schedule for the past 3, 6, 12 or 24 hours. By clicking on a particular app in the list, you will see detailed information: how much memory it is using now, how much it used in peak, and whether it has permissions to work in the background.

Special attention should be paid to applications that you have installed long ago and rarely use, they can have permissions to run in the background and synchronize data, taking up precious megabytes, Regular audit of installed software is the best prevention of memory shortage.

Optimizing application performance and limiting background activity

MIUI has a powerful application activity control mechanism that is often more effective than manual cleaning, so you can customize the behavior of each program individually, preventing it from running automatically or running in the background, and this is especially true for applications that don't require a constant Internet connection.

Go to Settings → Applications → All apps, select the right program and go to the Battery (or Energy Saving) section. Here you can choose a No Limits strategy if you need instant notifications, or Limit background activity if you only need the application when you opened it.

There's also AutoRun in the security settings, and by disabling autorunning for unnecessary programs, you prevent them from starting right after you turn on your phone, it frees up the system resources at the most critical boot time and leaves more space for your current tasks.

• 🔋 Open the settings of a particular application.
• 🔋 Find the Energy Saving Point.
• 🔋 Select the mode to limit background activity.
• 🔋 In the Security menu, turn off auto-start for heavy apps.

⚠️ Note: Do not limit background activity for messengers (WhatsApp, Telegram) and alarms, otherwise you will stop receiving messages on time or the phone will not wake you up on the alarm clock.

Resetting and Resetting: When Really Needed

Many users forget about the simplest but most effective cleaning method, which is to completely reboot the device. Unlike turning off and on the screen, rebooting completely clears the RAM, resets all temporary files, and restarts system services that may have leaked or accumulated errors.

It is recommended to reboot your smartphone at least once every 2-3 days, especially if you are actively using navigation, camera or heavy games. MIUI has a “Planned Reboot” feature that allows you to set up automatic on and off your phone, for example, at night while you sleep.

If the phone started to brake even after rebooting and cleaning, it may be a problem with deep system errors or data section overflows, which may require a more radical step, a factory reset, but this is an extreme measure that requires prior backup.

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Regular reboot (1-2 times a week) is more effective than daily manual cleaning through the “cleaner”.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)