How to Clean Up 'Other Files' Folder on Xiaomi: The Complete Guide

Xiaomi, Redmi and Poco smartphone owners often face intrusive notification of a lack of free space, even though the phone doesn’t seem to be full of apps or photos, and the culprit is a mysterious category in the storage called Other Files, a folder that is a hoard of system cache, temporary files, remnants of remote apps and downloads that the system can’t automatically classify.

The accumulation of this digital debris is not only annoying with notifications, but also significantly slows down the MIUI or HyperOS operating system. When the volume of the Other partition reaches tens of gigabytes, the phone starts to slow down when you start programs, and the processor works with increased load. Understanding what is hidden inside this directory is the first step to speeding up your device.

In this guide, we will discuss safe and effective ways to clean storage without the risk of deleting important personal data. You will learn how to use embedded system tools, third-party file managers and specialized utilities to analyze disk space.

What is hidden in the category "Other files"

Before you start deleting, you need to understand the structure of the data. The Others category is not a separate folder in the usual sense, but a logical combination of files that Android failed to categorize as standard types like Photos, Videos or Apps, which includes archives, documents, APK installation files and messenger cache.

Special attention should be paid to the garbage from social networks and instant messengers: apps like Telegram, WhatsApp and Viber store the history of correspondence, sent documents and cache of images in system directories, which are often marked as “Other”, and even if you delete the chat, its “tails” can remain in memory for months.

Also in this category are the remnants of remote games and programs: when uninstalled, applications often leave behind configuration files or temporary data in the root folders of the system, and over time, such “orphaned” files accumulate gigabytes, taking up valuable space.

• 📂 App cache: temporary data for fast content loading that often inflates to unthinkable sizes.
• 📂 Remnants of Remote Programs: Configuration Files and Libraries Leftover After Uninstalling Games.
• 📂 Downloads from the browser: old installers, PDF-Documents and archives you have downloaded and forgotten.
• 📂 System Logs: Error Reports and Work Logs Created by the Shell MIUI.

⚠️ Note: Before mass deletion of files from the category "Other" strongly advise to copy important documents to the computer or to the cloud.

Cleaning this category requires care, as blindly removing all content can cause individual applications to crash, for example, deleting the card cache may require re-loading regions, and cleaning up messenger data may cause loss of correspondence history if it was not stored in the cloud.

Analysis of storage through built-in MIUI tools

The safest and first method to use is the regular application “Security” or “Conductor” from Xiaomi, the company’s built-in algorithms are able to accurately determine the data that is safe to delete without affecting the system files necessary for the operation of the operating system.

To start, open the Explorer app and go to the memory analysis section. The system will scan and suggest clearing the garbage. However, standard cleaning often only affects the surface layer. For deep cleaning, go to the Cleanup menu and select Deep Clean if it is available in your firmware version.

Some versions of the HyperOS shell have a more detailed analyzer that allows you to go inside the Other folder and sort files by size, which allows you to manually select the heavy files that occupy the most space and delete them selectively without touching the little detail.

• 🔍 Size Sorting: allows you to instantly find giant files that occupy the lion’s share of memory.
• 🔍 Date filter: Helps you find old downloads you won’t use in the future.
• 🔍 Preview: Built-in feature allows you to make sure the file is indeed junk before you delete it.

⚠️ Note: Do not delete files with the.obb or.data extension from active game folders unless you want to lose progress or need to re-download the game resources.

The good thing about embedded tools is that they're integrated into the system and don't require super-user rights, but they're limited in functionality: they don't always see the cache of streaming services or the hidden folders of some banking applications that can also grow.

Use of Third-Party File Managers

When standard Xiaomi tools fail or show an incomplete picture, third-party file managers come to the rescue, a field that has been dominated for years by Total Commander, Solid Explorer, or FX File Explorer, which provide access to the file system at a deeper level.

To clean it effectively, you'll need a disk space analysis application (Disk Analyzer) that builds a visual memory card, where each square is a file or a folder, and the bigger the square, the more space it takes up, which allows you to instantly find hidden memory eaters that are hiding in the back of the system directories.

When working with third-party software, it is important to issue only the necessary permissions. To clean "Other Files" usually enough access to the storage, do not give full root access rights to unfamiliar applications unless it is urgently necessary, as this can compromise data security.

Pay special attention to the Android/data folder. This is where the cache and application data are stored. Inside this folder you can find heavy files from YouTube, Spotify, Telegram and other services. By deleting the contents of folders of specific applications, you clear their cache, but you don't affect personal settings.

Manual cleaning of system folders

For advanced users who know exactly what they're doing, manual cleaning is available, and it's the most effective, but it's also the most risky method, you'll need access to the root directory of the internal storage, and before you start any manipulation, make a full backup of important data, because an error can lead to loss of information.

First of all, check the Download folder. Often users forget about downloaded app installers, PDF-files and archives that have been dead for years, and it's worth looking at the folder. DCIM/.thumbnails — Here are stored miniatures of photos that can take several gigabytes.

Another "heavy" directory — MIUI/debug_log. Here, the system stores error reports. If you're not a developer and you're not debugging the firmware, you can clean that folder. Log files often have the.log or.txt extension and weigh a lot.

When manually cleaning, use the file manager's "Search for Big Files" feature, set the "More than 100MB" filter and study the results carefully, often with forgotten video files or database backups that can be transferred to your computer.

⚠️ Note: It is strictly forbidden to delete folders with the names of system processes (for example, android, data, obb in whole) or files with the.apk extension in system directories, unless you are sure of their origin by 100%.

After manual cleaning, it is recommended to restart the device, which will allow the system to recalculate the file index and correctly display the freed up space in the memory settings.

Cleaning the cache of messengers and social networks

Messengers deserve special attention, as they are the main garbage generators in the category “Other”. Telegram, for example, by default caches all the photos and videos viewed so that they are downloaded instantly when reopened. Over time, this cache can grow to 5-10 GB.

Telegram itself has a built-in cleaning tool. Go to Settings → Data and Memory → Memory Use. There you will see a “Storage Media” slider — set a limit, such as “3 days” or “1 week” — and there is a “Clear Cache” button that will safely delete temporary files without affecting your chats.

WhatsApp and Viber are similar, but files are often shared in media folders. On WhatsApp, go to Settings → Data and Storage → Storage Management. The system will show you the list of chats that take up the most space, and allow you to delete large videos and documents selectively.

• 🗑️ Automatic Cleaning: Set up auto-delete the cache in the settings of each messenger.
• 🗑️ Removal of forwarding: often thousands of identical images from group chats accumulate in chat rooms, they can be deleted en masse.
• 🗑️ Offline maps: Check out navigators (Yandex Maps, Google Maps) that can store gigabytes of maps for offline mode.

Remember that once the messenger cache is cleared, when you first open heavy chats, images will be reloaded, consuming Internet traffic, so this is best done when you connect to a Wi-Fi network.

Prevention and automation of cleaning

To keep the memory overflow problem from returning, it is important to maintain your smartphone regularly, don't wait for the system to start yelling about the space shortage, make time once a week or once a month for preventive cleaning.

Use automation. Xiaomi's Security app allows you to set up an automatic cleanup schedule. Although it's not always deep, it helps maintain basic system hygiene. Many file managers have a Planner feature that will remind you to clean up.

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Install the Cleanup widget on the home screen, and one tap on it will start the process of deleting temporary files, which will form a useful habit of keeping track of memory.

Rethink your storage habits. Stop storing huge libraries of music and video locally on your phone. Use cloud services (Google Photos, Yandex.Disk, Dropbox) with a “free space” function that deletes local copies after uploading to the cloud.

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Regular prevention takes 2 minutes a week, but saves hours of nerves when finding a place to take a new photo or app.

Also watch for updates to applications and the MIUI/HyperOS system itself. In new firmware versions, developers often optimize the file system and improve memory management algorithms, which can solve the problem of “bloating” the Other folder at the software level.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)