How to delete files Other on Xiaomi Redmi Note 7

The popular Redmi Note 7 smartphone often faces a situation where internal storage is filling up rapidly, and a standard disk analyzer shows that the lion’s share is occupied by the “Other” section. This mysterious sector can take up from 5 to 15 gigabytes, and the Android system does not always allow you to simply delete its contents.

The Other is a system category where MIUI puts all files that aren't in standard folders like Photos, Videos, or Documents, and includes messenger cache, temporary update files, remnants of remote programs, and system process logs, and understanding the structure of this storage is essential to clean the device properly without risking damage to the firmware.

In this article, we will discuss safe and effective methods of freeing up memory on your Xiaomi. We will not use questionable software-cliners, which often only harm, but use built-in tools and proven manual methods. You will learn to find hidden amounts of data and return the phone to its previous speed.

Anatomy of the Other Section in MIUI

Before we take any action, we need to understand what is behind the Other label. In the MIUI shell on the Redmi Note 7, this section is automatically generated, and the system groups files that it does not find the right category for, or that were created by applications that violate Android storage standards.

Most often, the volume is inflated by messengers such as Telegram or WhatsApp, which store the received images, videos and documents in their own folders, which the standard conductor does not always correctly recognize as media files, and also deposits cache of streaming services, offline maps of navigators and temporary browser files.

⚠️ Warning: Don't try to delete system files from Android root folders without first examining their purpose.Removing critical libraries can lead to a cyclical smartphone reboot.

Another source of debris is error logs and crash reports. If an app crashes frequently, it can generate text reports that take up space but do not benefit the average user, as well as data on app usage and statistics collected by Xiaomi’s analytics shell itself.

Using Xiaomi's built-in cleaner

The safest and first step for a Redmi Note 7 owner is to use the regular cleaning tool. Unlike third-party apps, the Cleanup in MIUI has deep access rights and knows which files to touch and which ones to avoid, and can be launched through the Security app, which is preinstalled on each device.

Once the scan is started, the system will prompt you to remove the obvious debris: advertising files, residues of deleted applications and temporary data. However, to work with the "Other" section, you need to go to deep cleaning mode.

In deep cleaning mode, MIUI will analyze large files, rarely used apps and duplicates, and you can see which programs occupy the most space in the Other category, often half of which are old TikTok or Instagram videos you've watched for a long time.

It is important to note that automatic cleaning does not always delete everything. Some files are labeled as “safe to delete” but require manual confirmation. Read the descriptions carefully: if it says “App Cache”, it can be safely deleted, it will not lead to loss of personal correspondence or progress in games.

Manual cleaning through the conductor

If the automatic tools fail, you need to move to manual file management. To do this, open the standard Explorer app on your Xiaomi. You will need to enable the display of hidden files, since many of the garbage data is hidden from the user's eyes. Click on three dots in the corner of the screen and select the appropriate item in the display settings.

First of all, look at the Android/data folder, which is where modern applications store their data, and inside this directory are folders with packet names, like com.whatsapp or com.google.android.youtube, often with cache or files folder bloated to giant sizes.

• 📂 folder DCIM: Check the.thumbnails folder, which stores thumbnails of photos and videos, and cleaning it can free up hundreds of megabytes.
• 📂 folder MIUI: Logs of error reports are often collected here (debug_logs) and backups of the recorder that you do not need.
• 📂 Tencent folder: If you use Chinese versions of apps or games from this developer, there may be gigabytes of temporary data.

When deleting folder content manually, be careful to remove only the contents of cache folders or explicitly temporary files with the.tmp extension. Do not touch database (.db) or configuration files (.xml,.json) unless you are sure of their purpose, otherwise the application may stop launching or reset settings.

Cleaning the cache of messengers and social networks

The messengers deserve special attention, since they are the main blowers of the “Other” section on the Redmi Note 7. Telegram, for example, stores all the media viewed in the phone’s memory by default. To fix this, you need to go to the settings of the application itself, go to the “Data and memory” section and find the “Memory Use” item.

Here you'll see the Clear Cache button. You can click on it boldly. This action won't remove your correspondence or photos from the messenger cloud, it will only erase local copies of files from your phone. When you reopen the chat, the image will be re-uploaded from the network if necessary.

WhatsApp has a similar situation, but it's a nuance: WhatsApp chat settings have a Storage Management feature that lets you see the hardest dialogs and delete media selectively, a more efficient way than clearing the cache completely through your Android settings, because it allows you to save important documents.

Remember, once the cache is cleared, the app can run a little slower on its first run, because it has to reload the data. This is normal behavior on the Android system. In a few minutes, everything will recover and the space will remain.

Analysis of storage by third-party utilities

When Xiaomi's built-in tools don't give you the full picture, specialized snails come to the rescue to visualize disk space, and one of the most effective is DiskUsage, or its modern counterparts available on Google Play, and they build a memory card where the squares are proportional to the size of the files.

Using these gates, you can instantly find hidden memory eaters, you can see that a file you forgot weighs 2 gigabytes, or that you have an old firmware file in your system update folder, and visualization helps you make a decision to delete faster.

When you use these programs on Redmi Note 7, you have to be careful, they show all the files, including the system files, if you see a file with a name that contains a system, vendor or boot, you better not touch it. Focus on the user folders and third-party applications.

Also worth mentioning is Files by Google, which has a built-in Cleanup feature that often works more aggressively and smartly than the standard one, finding duplicate files and blurry photos that also take up space but are not formally part of the Other section.

Radical methods: Resetting and flashing

If none of the above methods helped reduce the size of the Other partition and it continues to grow for no apparent reason, there may have been a file system error or a critical amount of system debris accumulated, in which case the final argument remains – a complete reset to factory settings.

Before you do this, make sure to back up all your important data. Reset will delete everything: contacts, photos, apps and settings. On Xiaomi, you can do this through the Recovery menu or through your phone's settings.

Settings -> About Phone -> Resetting -> Erase All Data

⚠️ Warning: Make sure the battery is at least 60% full before starting the reset. interruption due to discharge can "brick" the device, and then only the service center will help.

Once reset, the phone will go back to the store-like state, the "Other" section will be minimal, and if you start installing the same apps and the problem quickly returns, then one of the apps you installed has a critical bug that creates junk files.

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Tip: After resetting, do not restore applications from backup with packets. Install them manually - this will help to avoid returning old errors and junk files to the system.

Prevention of memory overflow

To prevent the problem with the “Other” section on the Redmi Note 7 from returning, you should stick to several rules of operation. First, check the Downloads folder regularly. Often, it automatically saves documents from browsers or files from messengers that you no longer need.

Second, set up automatic cleaning in the apps themselves, for example, Telegram can set a media storage limit: “Save media for 3 days” or “1 week”, which will prevent the cache from growing endlessly in the future.

• 📅 Weekly Habit: Open the Gallery once a week and delete failed shots and screenshots.
• 📅 Update control: After updating your system or applications, check if new large files have appeared.
• 📅 Cloud usage: Enable photo sync with Google Photos or Mi Cloud and enable Free Place».

Remember that filling internal memory by more than 90% negatively affects the speed of the entire smartphone. Flash memory starts to work slower when it does not have enough space for recording operations. So keeping 3-5 gigabytes free is not just a desire, but a necessity for stable MIUI operation.

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Regular prevention and control of the messenger cache avoid critical filling of the “Other” section and prolong the life of the smartphone drive.