How to remove excess from the phone Xiaomi: a complete guide to cleaning

Xiaomi smartphone owners often face a situation where the device starts to work slower and free disk space disappears for no apparent reason. This is a natural process of accumulating temporary files, application cache and system logs that occurs in any operating system, but in the shell of MIUI or HyperOS has its own characteristics. To return the gadget to its former friction, you need to comprehensively approach the issue of cleaning, affecting not only standard folders, but also hidden system partitions.

Many users mistakenly believe that it is enough to simply delete a few photos or unnecessary games. However, the real “eater” of space often hides deeper — in the residual files of remote programs, duplicate downloads and aggressive advertising that are broadcast by system services.

The first step to a clean smartphone should be to review files you created or downloaded yourself, most often filled with forgotten browser downloads, heavy video files from messengers and screenshots taken a year ago. The Android operating system does not delete this data automatically, considering it important to the user, so manual control is necessary here. First, you should open the standard Explorer or Files application, which is preinstalled on each device of the brand. Follow the path of internal memory → Download: This is where the bulk of digital junk accumulates: the installation files. APK, which have already been used, PDF-Documents and Forgotten Images. Boldly delete anything that is not valuable, especially files with the.apk extension, as they take up space but do not carry functional load after installing programs. 💡Before mass deletion of files from the Download folder, sort them by size - this will help you instantly see the largest unnecessary files. These apps have a habit of storing every photo and video they've viewed in the memory of the phone, creating duplicates. In the folder structure of Xiaomi, they're usually located at the address. Android/media/com.whatsapp Or in the root directory with the name of the messenger, and inside, look for the Images and Video folders, where you store media content from chat rooms. 🗑️ Remove old installation files APK download-folder. 📸 Check the Camera folder for any bad or blurry photos. 💬 Clean up the Voice and Video folders in the messenger directories. 📂 Find and delete the thumbnail folder that stores the gallery thumbnails.

After removing user debris, you need to deal with system temporary files. Cache is a buffer memory where data is stored for fast loading of frequently visited pages and running applications. Over time, this buffer grows to several gigabytes, and if the file in the cache is corrupted, this can cause errors in the operation of programs. Xiaomi smartphones have a powerful optimization tool that allows you to safely clean most of the temporary data without root rights. Go to the Security application (green shield icon) and select the Cache item, and the Cache section is quickly deleted, but the system will provide a special Cache for cleaning. Cleaning it requires rebooting and can temporarily slow down the phone until the system reassembles the cache. For deeper cleaning, use the Memory function in the settings. Go to Settings → Phone → Storage. Here, the system will show detailed diagrams of the place. Click on the Other or System Data category if this option is available in your version of MIUI. Sometimes it hides error logs and usage reports that can be safely deleted. It is important to understand the difference between cleaning the cache and cleaning the data. If you select "Other data" and the data, click on the "Other" category, click on the user's page, then you will only leave the account from the application, for example, you will use the user's page, but you will not use the user's account.

One of the main complaints against the brand is the presence of built-in advertising and a large amount of pre-installed software that cannot be removed in the usual way through the application menu. These programs, often called “bloatware”, not only take up space, but also consume RAM in the background, working as hidden processes. To get rid of advertising, you need to disable the MSA recommendation system (MIUI System Ads). Go to Settings → Passwords and Security → Access to personal data. Find the msa service in the list and turn off the switchboard. The system will insist on leaving everything as is there, working as it is, working as a hidden process, you need to get rid of advertising, you need to check the time for 10 seconds, just to check the end. ☑️ Xiaomi privacy settings Disable MSA:Remove system advertising Disable Mi Cloud:If you do not use the cloud Limit background activity: For heavy applications Disable personalization:In account settings Completed: 0 / 4 To remove system applications such as Mi Video, Mi Music, GetApps or games from partners, a standard uninstall menu may not be enough. If the Remove button is inactive, you can use the developer mode. 7 once-on MIUI In the "About the phone" section, then in the Advanced settings. → For developers, activate USB-And then you plug the phone into the computer, and you can use the tool. ADB (Android Debug Bridge for forced packet removal requires caution, as removing critical system components can lead to bootloop (cyclical reboot). adb shell pm uninstall -k --user 0 com.miui.videoplayer This command will remove the standard video player. Similarly, you can delete other packets knowing their exact name. Be careful not to delete Google Play services or com.android system components unless you are sure of their purpose.

Working with Android folder and hidden partitions Starting with Android version 11 And above, access to the folder. Android/data and Android/obb For third-party file managers, it is limited by Google's security policies, but Xiaomi's standard Explorer still has access to these directories, and it is where heavy game cache files and offline map data from the navigators are stored. If you delete a game but forget to clear its tails in the obb folder, they can take several gigabytes. → Android → Folders are named for package names (e.g. com.rockstargames.gtasa).If you are sure that the game has been deleted, the folder can be deleted without fear of being deleted. 💡The obb folder contains heavy game files, and the data folder contains settings and app cache. Only delete them if the application has already been removed or you are ready to reset its settings. It's also worth checking out Tencent's folder if you're using Chinese versions of apps or specific services. Inside, you often have a MicroMsg folder, which is the repository of all WeChat media files. It can grow to huge sizes. Inside, look for Video and Image folders to clean. Another hidden space eater is the.thumbnail folder in the DCIM directory. Here, the system stores sketches of your photos for quick display in the gallery. If you have thousands of photos, this folder can weigh 1-2 GB. It can be deleted, but the system will create it again the next time you run the gallery.

To systematize knowledge about which files and folders are safe to delete and which are better not to touch, use the following cheat sheet table. This will help avoid critical errors when manually cleaning the file system. Folder name / file Location Can be deleted? Consequences of deleting Download Memory root Yes (selectively) Deletion of user-downloaded Cache files Inside application folders Yes Applications will load a little longer for the first time System Memory root NO Complete phone failure MIUI Memory Root No (except Gallery folder) Theme and system services failure Backup MIUI/backup Yes (if there is a copy) Loss of backups of settings and contacts

After cleaning up, it is important to implement habits that will help keep the phone clean. Process automation is a key point for Xiaomi owners. The Security app has a “Acceleration” feature that can be set to automatically start when the screen is locked or on schedule. It is also recommended to turn off auto-save media files in messengers. In Telegram settings, go to Data and memory → Store in the gallery and turn off all the toggles. This will prevent duplication of images: they will remain in the Telegram cache, but will not take up space in the mobile network, if the group is in the cloud again, the reason will be filled up in the network. Limit downloads for mobile networks. Another effective method is to use cloud-based photo storage services such as Google Photos or Yandex.Disk, with the “Free Space” feature enabled. This feature automatically removes from the device those pictures that have already successfully uploaded to the cloud and have a backup copy. ⚠️ Warning: Before using the Free Space feature in cloud services, make sure that you sync 100%, otherwise you risk removing the original photos before they are uploaded to the cloud. Often we put a program on a one-time basis and then forget about it. Go to Settings. → Annexes → All apps and sort the list by frequency of use. Those marked as "Not used for 3 months" are candidates for removal.

FAQ: Frequently asked questions: Can you delete the Android folder completely? Absolutely not. The Android folder contains critical data for the entire operating system and installed applications. Its complete removal will result in resetting of all settings, data loss and possible phone failure. Only the contents of the cache, data and obb subfolders of specific remote applications can be deleted. Why is memory occupied again after cleaning? System processes and applications constantly create new temporary files. In addition, some applications (for example, maps or streaming services) can cache large amounts of data at each run. You can only delete the contents of cache, data from the remote applications, can not be synchronized from the Market to the high-synclip to the Player, can not be used locally? Most Third-Party Cliners on Android 10+ They have limited access rights and can't clean deeper than Xiaomi's standard Security app, and they often contain ads and run in the background, using up battery power. What if your phone says "Memory is full" when there's plenty of room? It could be a software failure to index files. Try rebooting your device. If it doesn't work, check the log folder at the root of the system, sometimes it's written huge error reports. Also, clear the cache of the Mediaservice or Media Storage app in the application settings. ⚠️ Warning: If after cleaning system files, the phone starts to work incorrectly (no sound, no Wi-Fi), reset to factory settings. To sum up, regular digital hygiene on Xiaomi requires less special knowledge than attention to detail. Using the built-in MIUI tools and understanding the structure of files, you can keep your smartphone running at a high level for years.