How to close open apps

[AceRockolla]

IPhone convert here. Still trying to adjust to the new os so please forgive the newbie question.

I'm trying to figure out what apps are currently open so I can close the ones I'm not using to conserve battery. When I double tap the home button it shows the apps so I can switch between them. I swipe the ones away that I don't want open anymore. Does this mean they are closed? Because when I go into settings and look at running apps there are way more in there than there is when I double tap the home button. Even ones I just swiped away. Maybe I'm not understanding how to properly close out a program. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[etbooker]

Welcome to Android!
If you swipe the application away it will clear it from your recent apps list, meaning that you won't see it the next time you open the multitasking bar but I'm not sure on whether the app will really be cleared out of your memory. Hope this helps.

Sent from my SCH-I605 using Android Central Forums

 

[pistos]

IPhone convert here. Still trying to adjust to the new os so please forgive the newbie question.

I'm trying to figure out what apps are currently open so I can close the ones I'm not using to conserve battery. When I double tap the home button it shows the apps so I can switch between them. I swipe the ones away that I don't want open anymore. Does this mean they are closed? Because when I go into settings and look at running apps there are way more in there than there is when I double tap the home button. Even ones I just swiped away. Maybe I'm not understanding how to properly close out a program. Any help is greatly appreciated.

With Android there is no longer any need to worry about what apps are open and running. The OS takes care of all of that housekeeping for you automatically. Just use the phone and enjoy it. The early versions of Android required more app management from you as a user. But that is no longer the case. Android is a truly multi-tasking OS, and the OS is intelligent enough to take care of the background stuff for you. When your phone needs more resources, the old apps are cleared out for you, etc. Just use the phone and have fun.

 

[doomstang]

Yes, what the person above me said. Of course, if you still want to manually close them - you can find plenty of "task killer" apps which can do that for you

Nooooo....task killer bad!

 

[AceRockolla]

Thanks guys. The fact that android can manage that itself makes me love it even more! So amazing.

I guess that's good for a memory management standpoint but is there any reason I would need to force close apps to preserve battery? The reason I ask is because when my battery gets low I get the warning which gives me the option to look at usage and there it lists all the apps that are using battery. My instinct is to close the ones I'm not using. But is force closing apps bad? I know when I try to do that I get warnings that say force closing can cause problems.

Just trying to understand how this all works. Thanks again!

 

[mrbootcrm]

I'm sure someone smarter than me will chime in but the way I understand it is killing apps in Android has a common effect of using more battery due to having to move the app back to memory when it is reopened. Basically, an app staying in memory for extended periods is more battery efficient than opening the app. Android manages all this in the background. Just use and enjoy.

 

[SCjRqrQCnBQ19QoYCtdl]

Thanks guys. The fact that android can manage that itself makes me love it even more! So amazing.

I guess that's good for a memory management standpoint but is there any reason I would need to force close apps to preserve battery? The reason I ask is because when my battery gets low I get the warning which gives me the option to look at usage and there it lists all the apps that are using battery. My instinct is to close the ones I'm not using. But is force closing apps bad? I know when I try to do that I get warnings that say force closing can cause problems.

Just trying to understand how this all works. Thanks again!

If a process is in background it is not typically running any processes - unless it is a very badly written app or it is an app that you want to run in the background, such as a music player.

The only thing be used by typical background apps is memory. That is good because memory is useless if not being used. If a foreground app needs memory then Android clears it automatically from the background.

As mrbootcrm stated, if you kill background apps, the system has to clear the memory, and then when that app is needed again, it has to load it back to memory, which uses processing power, i.e. battery and slows down the loading of the program.

Now, there are some apps that mis-behave. But you are better off I believe, to use a program like watchdog to identify those programs and once identified, either uninstall them or not based on your need for them.