Some apps are fun and help you pass the time. Other apps connect you with friends and family or make it easier for you to network and find work. And countless other apps provide news, time management features, shopping links, entertainment like movies and podcasts, and everything else under the sun. All in all, there’s an app for everything. But all apps have one thing in common: they take up storage space. Considering the resources they provide, it makes perfect sense that they should take up space; however, that doesn’t mean you want them to take up so much space that you’re left almost empty-handed trying to buy more storage or delete all the photos and videos you’ve ever taken in an attempt to gain space.
Some apps take up much more storage space than others. When it comes down to it, these five apps are among the worst when it comes to storage space. If you can delete them, your phone storage will thank you.
One report found that spending just 45 minutes a day on Facebook can result in the loss of 2 GB of data in one month. We can blame this app for taking up so much storage space: all the video content that autoplays, for example. There are some settings you can change to make the Facebook app take up less storage space, and you can even download Facebook Lite to save storage that way, but the number one way to make a dent in this storage stealer is by completely deleting the Facebook app. The good news is that you can access Facebook through your phone’s browser and never miss a moment when you’re hanging out with your friends.
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TikTok
Like Facebook, TikTok is a resource-intensive social media app that busily autoplays videos in an endless stream of content. Whether you’re watching content or creating your own, the app takes up a lot of storage space and a lot of battery power. In fact, the TikTok app takes up about 300 MB of storage space on your phone.
Pandora and music apps
Music streaming apps like Pandora take a toll on your storage space. When you download music, all those files stay until you delete them — and, if we’re being honest with ourselves, how often do we remember to delete music? Chances are you’ll want to keep all the music you’ve downloaded in case you want to listen to it again. Deleting music apps is a sacrifice, and it may not be worth it. A better approach might be to delete all but one music app and try to get rid of old files within the app that you never use.
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Shopping apps
Shopping apps like Amazon, Walmart, and Target can take up a surprising amount of storage space on your phone. These apps can become bloated with data collected from all your browsing while making purchases. Ask yourself if you really need these shopping apps on your phone — if you can access sites like Amazon in your browser, get rid of them.
Movie streaming apps
Similar to music and podcast apps, movie streaming apps like Netflix and Hulu can take up 1GB of data for every hour you stream content. If you think about how often you relax and enjoy movies and TV shows on these platforms, that’s a lot of data that quickly accumulates. It’s hard to choose just one streaming service because they all offer something different. But making it a priority to periodically delete the titles you’ve downloaded can help you maintain more storage space.