When you buy a brand-new Android smartphone or tablet, you often get some apps (bloatware) preloaded on those devices. Even the Nexus devices sold by Google also come with many Google-created apps that you probably don’t need at all. Manufacturers think these are the essential apps that you would need to get started with your device and therefore they include it with the stock firmware. However, most of the users like me do not ever need these apps and so the apps are nothing but junk for them. These apps take away your valuable limited memory space that could otherwise be used to install your favorite apps. Well, there is a solution to remove these apps from your device and free-up some disk space.
What You Need to Know
Only those users having root on their device can remove bloatware. If you are not rooted, please root your device first and then follow this guide.
Make sure to not remove all the system apps as some of them are used by your device’s OS.
Getting Started with Removing Bloatware:
You are going to install an app from the Google Play that will help you remove bloatware from your device.
Install NoBloat Free from the Play Store.
Once the app is installed on your device, launch it by opening your App Drawer and tapping on the app’s icon.
The first time you launch the app, it will ask you to grant Superuser privileges. This is only available after you have rooted your phone. Hit the “Grant” button and you are done.
The main interface shows the options available to you. Tap on the first option that says “System apps” as that is where the bloatware is located.
You should now see the list of all the apps installed on your device. These are the apps you can remove from your device and free-up your memory space. Tap on any app you wish to remove.
When you tap on an app, it will give you some options to choose from, which are:
- Disable – It will disable the app on your device.
- Backup – It will backup the selected app.
- Backup and delete – It will backup the selected app and then delete it.
- Delete without backup – It will delete the app without creating the backup.
The last option is what you will need to choose. Tap on it and then “Okay”and it will remove the app from your device.
It will then start the procedure to remove the selected app from your device.
Once the app has been removed, it will no longer show-up in the apps list.
The bloatware has been removed from your Android device and you now have some free memory space to play around with.
Alternative for NoBloat
If you are not a fan of NoBloat, Titanium Backup is a more powerful app that you can use to remove bloatware (or any other system apps). It requires a rooted phone too.
Conclusion
Bloatware apps have been a headache for most of the users as they eat-up your limited storage and even worse you can’t delete them from your device as you would any other apps. With the help of tools like NoBloat, getting rid of bloatware has become much easier.
Mahesh Makvana is a freelance tech writer who’s written thousands of posts about various tech topics on various sites. He specializes in writing about Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android tech posts. He’s been into the field for last eight years and hasn’t spent a single day without tinkering around his devices.
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