Phone Storage Optimization

Hey MPU,

I was wondering on everyone’s settings regarding their phone storage.

256GB phone, I have about 20GB of free storage, so some apps like WhatsApp have stopped backing up my chats. I cleaned out as much media as I could from WhatsApp and only kept the essentials regarding group conversations and projects.

  1. Does anyone use the offload apps function? That will save me 12GB.

  2. Day One takes up 25GB for me, I didn’t do any optimizations on there.

  3. Photos takes up 65GB as well, I didn’t do any optimizations on there either.

Has anyone had issues with enabling these optimizations? In the past, I used to backup my photos to my NAS and then purge my phone. But with a growing family and constant picture sharing, there’s less time to purge, and easier to set an app to just upload when home.

I have been using DS Photo on my Synology, I haven’t switched over to Moments yet.

Thoughts?

I do not use option #1 because I’m afraid I’ll be offline when I need an app that has been offloaded. I have Day One installed but have not begun using it beyond thinking about it every so often.

I do use iCloud Photos and have all of my mobile devices set to optimize photo storage. I have an always-on iMac that is set to download and keep originals gets regularly backed up via Backblaze, CCC, and Time Machine so am OK with not having originals on the phone until/unless I need to make an edit. However, if the phone was the only place I could store originals between manual sync/backups, I would not use this option.

I did just pick up a Synology but have not yet worked through all of the packages to see how else to set up a reliable backup scheme.

You could try:

  • remove duplicate photos - I do this on a Mac but it has benefits to be phone when I delete those photos
  • I use offload apps - works fine if you have apps you hardly use and you’re rarely offline
  • do you really need your Day One to be fully downloaded onto your phone? I don’t use it so not sure if you have an option
  • remove some big, unused apps (e.g. you might have Excel/Word/PowerPoint AND the Apple alternatives
  • take some music offline if you have an offline library on Spotify, etc (plus podcasts)

Just a side note. I think of the Day One app as a resource app vs. a journaling app only. I make multiple journals. I put study notes in there. I have a journal for acronyms (just discovered this today). Recently I took photos inside a bin and called the journal “storage”. Other times I reflect on something I just read. Give it a try when the mood hits :sunglasses: