I’ll readily admit I have a poor knowledge of technical issues.
I have a mobile phone (a Samsung A12). The storage is almost filled up and the phone is telling me there are some functions I can’t use because storage is too full.
Okay, I’ve encountered this problem before. I’ll just go through some old pictures and delete some.
But that’s not working. My phone is telling me I don’t have enough storage space to delete image files.
How can I not have enough storage space to delete a file? And if I’m not able to delete any files, how will I free up storage space?
The operating system needs access to a certain amount of storage space. When storage space is very low this interferes with the ability to do anything, so you might not even be able to uninstall apps you aren’t using (but try that anyway) Your best bet is going to be to connect it to a computer and back up your data. Then do a factory reset. After the reset you should have the option to restore a backup (either from the cloud or your computer) and selectively restore your data.
Also, going forward consider using a cloud service to backup your photos instead of storing them on your phone. I use OneDrive, but Amazon photo back up is included with a Prime membership (or used to be).
I hardly ever download or use apps. In the years since I’ve bought this phone, I’ve only downloaded four new apps on it. And I subsequently deleted two of those.
I’ve also deleted several of the apps that came with the phone. I’d actually like to delete more that I’ve never used but apparently Samsung signs a contract with some companies and their apps are protected from being deleted.
I’ve transferred a lot of pictures from my phone to my laptop but I can’t figure out how to do it directly. When I connect a date transfer cord it doesn’t seem to make the right connection. So I have to use a very work-around process where I email the pictures from my phone and then transfer them from the email on my computer.
I’m generally against the idea of cloud storage. I’m a physical media guy. I keep my backups on portable memory devices that I have physical ownership of.
Try restarting your phone. Sometimes that will free up some space.
You can also connect your phone to a PC and then use it like an external disk drive. The photos will be in the DCIM\Camera folder (DCIM=Digital Camera IMages). You can usually do a force delete (SHIFT+DEL) from there so that it immediately deletes the image and doesn’t send it to recycling.
I personally download all of my photos off of my phone to my PC so that the photos are then backed up with the rest of my files. Then I can delete whatever I don’t want off of my phone and I don’t need to worry about deleting a photo that I might want later.
On an Android phone connected to a Windows computer, you should be able to browse to the DCIM folder on the phone in Windows Explorer and either cut or copy and paste them to a folder on your computer. Using cut and paste should also delete them from your phone.
Now that I think about it, I remember Android having a USB setting that you might need to tweak for this to work - i.e. the connection has to be for data transfer instead of charge only. That might be why you have connection problems. IIRC you can swipe down from the top when it’s connected to change the connection type. But it’s been a few years since I’ve used Android.
From what I remember, the A12 has a memory card slot for a micro sd. you should be able to transfer photos etc to this and then set this as the default location for future pictures to get some more life out of your phone
When you connect a cable between a PC and an Android, both devices ask if you want to connect for data transfer. “Yes” on both sides is the only way it works. Problem is if you ever answered “No” it remembers that answer and won’t ask this time unless you fiddle around in the Android and/or Windows settings to alter that default.
Okay, this has done something. I plugged the data transfer cord in and swiped down on the screen.
Did this let me transfer the photos? No.
But it did, for some reason, allow me to transfer the thumbnails of the photos. So I went ahead and transferred the thumbnails from my phone to my laptop.
I didn’t want to delete the thumbnails off my phone because I wanted to use them to access the photos. And I still wanted to transfer the photos to my laptop.
So I didn’t delete anything off my phone. But somehow transferring the thumbnails from my phone to my laptop awoke some ancient knowledge. Even though nothing had been deleted my phone decided it now had enough storage space to let me delete things.
So I transferred a bunch of photos from my phone to my laptop using the old method of sending them via email. Then I went back and deleted them off my phone. Then I went into the trash and actually deleted them for real.
I won’t say my phone is working great but it’s now back to working as poorly as it did last week.
It is a truism of the smartphone business that older phones, despite no active efforts on your part, will have ever-shrinking available storage. This is especially true of older budget phones. Because while you may have adequate (rarely generous) internal storage when first released, years of OS updates, App updates, photos/music will eat into that. Even if you yourself never add an additional ap, those OS/App updates.
One of the reasons the modern “default” storage on a smartphone is around 128G. I have a similarly aged Samsung tablet that came with 32G. I’ve deleted everything allowed off it to continue running, and the only “extra” apps are a better browser with some adblocking.
I have 4GB total storage available with just the default OS and those 2 additional apps - plus the undeletable options. No music, no photos. When it was New, it had over 12G of storage available with More apps installed.
Now your model may have the same 32G (which was the minimum) or the 64/128G options, but this is a problem likely to happen again despite your care.
As noted upthread, it should have a microSD slot, but I have never had much luck when it comes to the longevity of such things (others have very different experiences), and while it’s a great option for storing photos, it is problematic for some apps, and no help when it comes to OS bloat.
In my experience, SD storage is a great solution for photos, music, and documents you want to keep on your phone (I’m one of those old farts who insists on keeping my 50 GB music collection on my phone). I was unaware that the A12 had an SD slot. About 10 years ago, manufacturers started phasing out card slots but its presence is good news for @Little_Nemo. Unfortunately, Android won’t let you install apps on a microSD card and that storage is kept separate from internal storage. So you can probably configure your phone to store all your photos etc. on a card. There is also probably a limit to what size card the phone will recognize (64 or 128 GB is typical - 32 for older devices). But it might well get a few more years of use out of the device, so it’s worth looking into.
PS - keeping your stuff on a card has another benefit because you can just use a card reader to transfer photos from the card to your laptop instead of the cable.
So the company designs the phone with a limited amount of storage and then intentionally fills that limited space up with unrequested updates. And when they’ve wrecked the phone they tell you the “solution” is for you to buy another phone.
This is the wrong forum for me to express my opinions on this subject.
That’s a bit of an oversimplification. Those unrequested updates are really pretty critical in terms of keeping you protected. But the solution to the bloat from years of updates is the first thing I suggested - back up your data and do a factory reset. I do this at least once a year for everyone in my house. And it’s a lot cheaper than buying a new phone.
I used to have that problem, too. Samsung phones have improved since then. I have a 6 1/2 year-old Samsung S22 and I haven’t come close to filling it up, despite dozens of downloaded podcasts, some music, many apps, and photos. Too bad the battery life isn’t great.
What email program do you use on your phone? Samsung or Gmail?
When you email them to your laptop, is the destination email address also available on your phone? In other words, do you also get a copy of the photo emails on your phone?
If you don’t already have an SD card in the phone, I’d recommend installing one. If you do, I’d suggest a larger one (if you’re not maxed out already).
This is a bit of a tangent, but yes, of course the company designs the phone with a limited amount of storage. Do you think they have the option to design it with an infinite amount of storage? They design the phone with an amount of storage that seems reasonable at the time, and usually give the buyer several options for the amount of storage they want. More storage = more cost of course, and few customers would pay for a phone that has 10 times the storage they actually need. The problem is that software keeps getting more and more sophisticated, and therefore larger. A phone that could easily store all necessary software in 2010 may not have enough storage to handle software with equivalent functionality in 2026. In many (most) cases, the phone manufacturer is not the entity that writes or supplies the software, so they’re not responsible for the fact that the software has gotten too big to fit in an old phone. Perhaps a more customer-friendly option would be to allow upgrading the phone’s memory without buying a new phone, but it’s not very feasible to fit memory sockets in the limited amount of physical space available in a phone’s chassis.