Why so little internal storage left? (32GB Galaxy S7)

[se_lest]

Hey I have a question if anyone is able to help out.

TLDR:
-32GB galaxy s7 on Verizon
-~8.5gb of user data I am aware of on internal storage (8gb in apps, .5 in other files, all pictures etc. on SD card).
-<500mb internal storage available at best and can often barely use the phone.
-Is this normal/anything I can do?

Detailed version:

I am on a 32GB Galaxy S7 on Verizon. My phone doesn't have much free space on internal storage left. Its around 500mb free right now after cleaning it up a bit but keeps getting down to 100mb or even 40 or 50mb and I have to use the "device maintenance>Optimize Now" feature to clear up an extra 50-100mb now and then just to continue receiving messages. I can rarely download let alone update apps. As you can imagine, not ideal.

I keep all my pictures and audio and such on an SD card and clean out my downloads and such, so there's really only a few hundred mb of stuff on the internal storage besides apps. At least as far as I can find whether plugging it into my computer or looking at the "storage" section of the phone's settings.

And I have 7.9GB in Apps. So probably 8.5 GB total of user data that I'm aware of (including all the bloatware I can't uninstall... that damn NFL app laughing at me...). Is the OS etc. really 22+GB? Is there something I am missing that is taking up all of my internal storage?

As far as apps, I really only have a few things besides the preinstalled junk, venmo, gmail, youtube, google photos, spotify (switched to save any downloads to SD card)... I've moved the storage locations to SD for everything that gave me an option to do so.

My biggest problem that I can find is Textra taking up 4GB (of the aforementioned 8GB/32GB that are taken by apps). I have switched to signal and am trying to figure out how to backup images from textra to my computer so I can delete the data from the app (i didn't have mms images saving to gallery so I don't know how to find them without downloading/saving them individually first. Looking into sms backup and restore as I type this which hopefully could help get these images somewhere I can deal with them more easily).

But I'm wondering if there shouldn't be such a shortage of space to begin with. Anyone know if this is normal or what can be done?

 

[Javier P]

Welcome to the forums. Try the steps explained in this thread. Textra can go wild sometimes

https://forums.androidcentral.com/showthread.php?t=841009

 

[Javier P]

Also, do you have any other messaging app?

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! Try using DiskUsage to get a better idea of what's taking up space.

 

[mustang7757]

System apps take another 7 to 8gb so u have to account for that but Textra 8gb is a lot

 

[se_lest]

@B. Diddy

Thanks for the replies. I downloaded DiskUsage. It shows "System data" as 21 GB.

Everything else is under Media which is 1.31GB including Recorders (617 mb) Whatsappp (381mb) Textra (139mb) DCIM (105mb) and Android (63.7mb)

 

[se_lest]

@Javier P

Thanks for the reply. I will try the textra resync thanks a lot for that tip. I have signal as default now. I still have the "Messages" "Message+" and "Hangouts" apps which I cannot uninstall on there as well.

 

[B. Diddy]

Try also wiping the cache partiiton: https://www.t-mobile.com/support/de...t/wipe-cache-partition-samsung-galaxy-s7-edge

 

[se_lest]

@B. Diddy

Thanks for the advice. I was hoping it'd be the solution, and I just wiped the cache partition, but the DiskUsage screen remains the same and my insternal storage remains tiny.

Not sure what is in that 21 GB of system data...

 

[B. Diddy]

Go to Settings>Apps, tap Menu>Show System, then look through the system apps to see if anything stands out there in terms of storage usage.

 

[se_lest]

@B. Diddy

Thank you for your continued help!

The one real outlier found here is Dialer Storage which has 4GB as the listed size... There is no option to "Clear Data" for it though and the Data is where all of the storage is. (And I'm still figuring out what exactly I would be deleting.)


There are one or two other potentially weirdly big apps like Google Play Services and Google but I can try to deal with that after figuring out what is going on with Dialer Storage

 

[Javier P]

@B. Diddy

Thank you for your continued help!

The one real outlier found here is Dialer Storage which has 4GB as the listed size... There is no option to "Clear Data" for it though and the Data is where all of the storage is. (And I'm still figuring out what exactly I would be deleting.)


There are one or two other potentially weirdly big apps like Google Play Services and Google but I can try to deal with that after figuring out what is going on with Dialer Storage

Dialer Storage includes all the media files from your SMS messages. See this thread.

https://www.reddit.com/r/GalaxyNote..._source=amp&utm_medium=&utm_content=post_body

 

[Javier P]

Did you try the re-sync in Textra?

 

[se_lest]

Hi @Javier P

Thank you so much for the advice, I tried the re-sync and it cleared up 3GB of space! That has given me enough breathing room to operate normally again and I really appreciate your help.

The dialer storage is still 4GB, if I understand correctly the only way to sort through that is to delete media/images from textra message threads themselves? Might be tedious but at least it won't wipe everything out indiscriminately.

Regardless of anything else, thank you again for the re-sync tip.

 

[BergerKing]

System apps take another 7 to 8gb so u have to account for that but Textra 8gb is a lot

Massive, actually. I think Textra is really better designed for far more powerful, and spacious phones.

 

[mustang7757]

Massive, actually. I think Textra is really better designed for far more powerful, and spacious phones.

I used it once couple years back but it didn't have a back up or rcs so didn't like it , but if it uses that much GB must be lot of messages with pictures

 

[J Dubbs]

I used it once couple years back but it didn't have a back up or rcs so didn't like it , but if it uses that much GB must be lot of messages with pictures

Lot's of messages with pictures... sounds juicy Good thing it isn't an iPhone, since Apple just announced they're going to be regularly scanning all iPhones, iMessages, email accounts, and icloud storage for anything that resembles child abuse, and reporting it to law enforcement. At least that's where they're starting

Who knows who'll end up looking at what, and what they'll do with it Good thing Apple's all about privacy right?

 

[Javier P]

Hi @Javier P

Thank you so much for the advice, I tried the re-sync and it cleared up 3GB of space! That has given me enough breathing room to operate normally again and I really appreciate your help.

The dialer storage is still 4GB, if I understand correctly the only way to sort through that is to delete media/images from textra message threads themselves? Might be tedious but at least it won't wipe everything out indiscriminately.

Regardless of anything else, thank you again for the re-sync tip.

Excellent! Glad it helped. And yes, to make Dialer Storage smaller you need to manually delete media files in your Messages (Textra) app. Start for big videos and high res pics.

 

[se_lest]

Will try that. Thanks again to you and the others who have helped out. A small but frustrating weight off my shoulders haha