What's the best way to transfer from one S6 to another S6? Smart Switch? Helium? Android SDK method?

[Magic815]

I'm in the process of getting a replacement S6 sent out to me. The charging port on my first one had issues with the cable seating in it. I figured I didn't want to live with it for the next two years, so I'm returning it to Verizon before my 14 day "trial" ends.

However, I've spent countless hours setting up/tinkering with my phone to get it exactly how I want it. I've got Nova Launcher, Nox icon pack, widgets galore. I have countless Tasker profiles, Lux brightness profiles, etc. And of course all my photos, texts, videos, music, contacts, etc.

I basically have a few days to transfer everything over to the new S6, and want to figure out the best course of action for transferring over everything and minimizing the time spent on getting my phone back to exactly how I have it set up. Please note that I am on Verizon, so my S6 is not rooted. Thus, Titanium Backup is out of the question.

I see the Smart Switch is the new Samsung software for the S6, and can be used for this. I see that Helium is a well regarded app for non-rooted phones and could work. And then I also stumbled across this article: How to create a full backup of your Android device without root - TechRepublic

So my question is this: Which method will work the best? Which will backup the most items (including app settings would be awesome), so that the amount of setting up I have to do is minimized. I know that my contacts and apps are sync'd to my Google account, but I'm worried about all my other stuff. I appreciate any help you can give!

 

[Cobravision]

Samsung Smart Switch in the app store will transfer all the files, contacts, texts, and some of the settings.

Make a backup of Nova and once everything is reinstalled, restore from it on the new phone.

I was able to restore my phone, more or less, within 2 hours this way. Much faster than it used to be in the past. There are still some pain points, like there doesn't seem to be a way to restore playlists. That part is a separate hour.

 

[20blks]

Smart Switch is the best way. It's also much faster than helium

 

[erasat]

Use Smart Switch and do a Full backup but don't rely just in that, do a Nova Backup and save it on a PC, then use Helium and if you don't want to pay for the PRO version just do a backup with the App and data of everything possible and save the full folder on a PC and then pass it to the new phone and restore from it after installing Helium. It works great for almost all apps, there are some that are not allowed to be backed up though.

 

[Magic815]

Ok, thanks all for the help!

 

[instigator31]

I am doing the same thing and have a quick follow up...

Seems like I first MUST connect to google in order to download Smart Switch on my new replacement S6, but when I do that it will start syncing google contacts, etc.

Assume that is all ok and I still do the stuff mentioned above ?