Why do apps automatically move back to the SD card even without updating?

[Luca Aster]

Model: Samsung Galaxy J7 Crown
Android version: 9
Whenever I move apps to the SD card to free up storage, they stay there for about a day, and then I'll get the orange "Storage space running out; some functions may not work" notification and when I go to check, many of the apps have migrated automatically back to internal storage. I understand that this often happens when apps update, but there's no way they're updating that often. I have tried to change the SD card to the default install location too, but my phone seems to have that option disabled.

 

[anon(10614692)]

There's not a great deal you can do about that other than make sure you keep media on your SD card and apps in internal storage. Maybe if the apps are running in the background it will move them to internal storage

 

[mustang7757]

I wouldn't keep sd card as Internal storage , they can get corrupted slow downs , freeze it's just not as fast as Internal storage best use it as portable.


I'll leave a link to register so you can communicate here, as a guest account u cant .
https://forums.androidcentral.com/showthread.php?t=409154

 

[B. Diddy]

I understand that this often happens when apps update, but there's no way they're updating that often.

Welcome to Android Central! Are you sure about that? Some apps get updated pretty often. Pay close attention for the next week or so and see if this truly is the case.

 

[Luca Aster]

You might be right. If that's the case, do you know of any way that I can override the restriction and switch the SD card to be the default install location? It's really frustrating that Samsung has so many features disabled.

 

[Mooncatt]

You might be right. If that's the case, do you know of any way that I can override the restriction and switch the SD card to be the default install location? It's really frustrating that Samsung has so many features disabled.

Samsung and other manufacturers disable adoptable storage because it's simply never was a good idea nor recommended. Keeping apps on the SD card will corrupt it relatively quickly and are best left on the internal storage.

That phone is a low level budget line device with only 16 GB of internal storage. It also likely has low specs all around. These devices are good for making a phone call and not much else. In other words, you get what you pay for.

 

[anon(10614692)]

Unfortunately, no. Developers write their apps forcing internal storage to be used. Internal storage is faster than SD cards, more reliable and more durable than SD cards which are slow and corrupt easily.. This is not just a Samsung thing either. By design SD cards are meant for media, not handle a massive amount of read/write operations while using gaming, for example

 

[Rukbat]

The read part isn't the problem, but SD cards are rated in the number of write cycles, and a game on an SD card could be writing to it many times a second. That can destroy an almost indestructible SD card in a month. (SD cards are basically Write-once/Read-many devices.)