Android memory is full, although there is nothing there - what to do?

Many owners of Android devices face the problem of full memory.

It seems like there aren’t many user files saved, but the drive is still full. There are several reasons for this problem - consider each of them.

But first, a note for novice users. The largest amounts of memory are usually occupied by videos. We recommend going to the “Gallery” and checking your smartphone for unnecessary materials. Unused videos, downloaded movies, video clippings - all this accumulates in the file system and takes up memory. Delete unnecessary videos, photos and other data downloaded from WhatsApp or other apps and instant messengers. They are saved in a separate folder located in DCIM.

Clearing phone cache

First of all, you need to clear the cache on your Android smartphone. There are several cleaning methods. Let's start with the basic settings:

1. Open your smartphone's settings.
2. Go to the “Memory” or “Storage” section.
3. Select the “Cache Data” section and click the “Delete Cache” button.
4. Next, click “OK” to complete the cleanup.

Also, the cache memory on Android is cleared through special applications (which have recently deteriorated greatly). Here is a cleaning method using the CCleaner utility as an example (the program is available on Google Play). After installing it, follow the following algorithm:

1. Go to the application, select the “Clear cache and memory” option and click on the “Analysis” button.
2. Once the system scan is complete, check the “Cache” option and select “Clear.”
3. Cache, temporary files and other garbage are automatically deleted from the phone.

If you have any questions, be sure to read the more detailed article on clearing the cache. Note that one of the most effective methods for clearing cache memory is the Wipe cache partition section in the Recovery menu.

Cleaning with apps

If you have considered all the ways to clean other files on Samsung, and the proposed options are not satisfactory, use one of the many applications. Let's highlight several popular programs that help clear your phone's memory of garbage:

1. SD Maid is an application that allows you to clean the system of your device and keep it in working order. The program's functions allow you to create crash reports, delete unnecessary files, receive a detailed analysis of the device's operation, and detect duplicate music and photos. In addition, you can automatically launch applications at specific times (if required). The software has a simple interface and can work without root rights. If you have Superuser rights, the possibilities expand. They increase even more if you purchase the paid version.
2. CCleaner is one of the best programs that allows you to clean your phone and memory card on your Samsung phone. Using the software, you can quickly delete unnecessary data, speed up the operation of your mobile device, and remove the cache and browser history. In addition, the software successfully copes with software removal, analyzing the impact of programs on the phone and solving other problems. This is a powerful assistant that copes with all the tasks assigned to it and helps clean the device.
3. Clean Master is high-quality software designed to optimize and ensure the security of smartphones. With its help, you can easily clear your Samsung phone of unnecessary data, protect it from viruses, save battery power, speed up the device and solve other problems. Additional features include a charging wizard, Wi-Fi security and much more.

Users have dozens of applications at their disposal that allow them to clear the operating space on their smartphone. There is no point in listing them all. In all cases, the interface is simple, downloading is available on the Play Market, and use itself is free. To expand the functionality, you can always buy a paid version.

Cleaning up unnecessary files

Large amounts of unwanted data most often accumulate in download or messenger folders, as well as in the hidden .thumbnails directive. We recommend that you conduct a thorough analysis of the file system. The disk analyzer DiskUsage, which is also downloaded from Google Play, is suitable for this operation.

After installation, go to the program and select the “Memory Card” option. All data that is on the device is collected here. Select the unnecessary file and delete it. To do this, go to the menu in the upper corner of the screen and click the “Delete” button.

DiskUsage is suitable for individually deleting files and analyzing disk space, but the application is inconvenient for mass cleaning of the system. Also, you won’t be able to view media files here; it is recommended to use some kind of explorer or task manager for this.

Freeing up RAM

Random access memory (RAM or RAM) is actively used by applications loaded on the gadget and serves as storage for temporary data. Most often, there is not enough RAM if several applications are running on the device at the same time, some of which are running in the background, and the user is not even aware of it. A large queue of tasks can cause display errors (for example, when launching a browser), waste battery power and lead to overheating of the device.

In many smartphones, the RAM “cleaning” functions are provided by the manufacturer and work automatically. If you still need to force close programs, this is done through the “Settings” → “Applications” button. Next, a list of all applications will open; when you click on each of them, you will be offered two options: the “Delete” button and the “Stop” button.

There are also a number of special programs - task killers (from English “process killers”):

• Advanced Task Manager;
• Super Task Killer (Super Toolbox);
• Auto Task Killer.

Deleting files from the hidden .thumbnails folder

The .thumbnails directive is located in the DCIM folder - in the gallery where photos and videos are stored. Thumbnails store thumbnails of media files so that the smartphone can load thumbnail tiles faster in the future. Over time, several gigabytes of thumbnails accumulate, especially if the owner of the device likes to take pictures or shoot videos.

For example, one of the editorial office’s smartphones stores 500 photos. The size of the .thumbnails folder is 1 GB. This space can be easily freed up.

Since the .thumbnails directive is hidden by default, you won’t be able to access it through the gallery. To diagnose and delete thumbnails, it is recommended to download the Total Comander application. Next you need to do the following:

1. Go to the installed Total Comander application and find the .thumbnails folder there (it is located in the DCIM folder).
2. Under the list of saved thumbnails in the lower left corner of the screen there is a “Select” button - click it.
3. Then click on the cross at the bottom of the panel to delete existing thumbnails.

The only drawback to this operation is that now the thumbnails will load a little slower. After clearing the .thumbnails folder, the device will start creating new thumbnails again. To prevent this, you will need to block the creation of thumbnails.

Vsesam

I opened the topic “File system limit” on the official Samsung forum. See what he and other participants who joined recommend doing.

My question:

Hello, my Samsung phone says file system limit after 1 month of use. Are there any solutions?

Samsung's response:

“File system limitation: Too many files have been created on the phone. Apps may stop working correctly and your phone may no longer start. Back up all your important data and reset your phone."

My question:

I did a factory reset and now I'm getting it again.

Samsung's response:

The best thing you can do is contact a professional and take it to a service center

Timur:

First question: what phone are you using and how much free space does it have? Sometimes this may be when your storage is almost full or there are too many audio files stored on WhatsApp. You can go to My Files -> Internal Storage > WhatsApp > Media > WhatsApp Voice Memos and delete unnecessary files. This won't cause any problems and hope it helps!

IMPORTANT INFORMATION

There is another great way to fix problems in Samsung phone - - read more here
Friend:
I had the same problem and it worked for me. I went into settings, then apps and sorted by size. It turns out that an application that shouldn't take up much space was taking up all my memory, probably due to the huge number of files. I deleted the data, but the message came back.

Marshals:

Hi, I had the same problem and this worked for me. Go to settings, then apps, then sort by size. Force stop initial applications that create data on the back end. And now you won't see the messages.

Tulip:

I've encountered this on several different devices. The problem is usually due to a bad update of the application, which causes the application to create false files. Open settings, then go to Applications, now sort applications by size. This will show you which apps are taking up the most space.

Clear your cache to remove unnecessary files and check for updates. If the update is not available, uninstall the app, restart your device, and then reinstall the app. This clears software with errors. If the app does this again, uninstall the app and try downloading it again in a couple of days as the app developer will want to fix the error as quickly as possible.

Passerby:

I have the same problem after 2 months - I did a full reset, cleared the cache - it helps for a while, but after a couple of days the message appears again.

I called the Smasung support hotline in Germany, but they didn't know what the problem was and offered to send them the phone to physically check it. But I don't believe this is a hardware issue. Any other suggestions? Are there tools to find out which application is consuming many file nodes?

Armageddon:

I have the same problem, last week I did a factory reset and the error returned. Are there any solutions since I have a lot of memory and storage space on my phone?

Nilesh Rupir:

Guys, I have a solution for this. I'm using Samsung J7 prime (no root) and I also had "File System Restriction". I tried clearing the cache and so on, but it didn't help. What I tried to do is that I clicked the notification message for some second and it opened settings (Android systems) and then I clicked (force stop), the message (file system limit) disappeared and then my phone works fine. In my opinion, this is a bug in the system and it is a very common mistake.

Adrians:

Hi people. I had this problem 3 days ago. The same message appeared, but in my case, the phone freezes and freezes from time to time, images do not appear in the gallery, applications crash from time to time, the fingerprint reader sometimes stops working, and so on.

I thought maybe there wasn't enough memory space, so I freed up 9 GB of internal memory and 5 GB of external memory. No difference.

I tried safe mode but it keeps causing the same problem. In most cases, even the game store is not working.

Last night, after following the advice above (force restarting the Android service), the message disappeared and the phone got better, much better.

Until this morning when Wi-Fi won't turn on. I then restarted my phone and the wifi was fine again but the fingerprint didn't work. When opening WhatsApp, the messages were corrupted and I had to restore the backup from yesterday. This took a long time as the phone kept freezing.

And now the “File system limit” message appears again.

What can I do? I really don't want to factory reset my phone as I have a lot of settings in my apps and putting everything back in place would be a huge PITA.

Moderator:

Something tells me you'll need more than a factory reset - you'll have to reflash the ROM. Then restore everything you backed up.

Adrians:

A few days before the problem started, a 25 MB update was installed. I think it's a security patch. Could this be the reason? Is it possible to remove this update without flashing it? I just remember that many months ago, for no reason, the phone restarted on its own and did a factory reset. I remember there was a message that there was a serious software issue and so the phone was reset to factory settings. At the time I only had a few apps and a lot of free space as I was still using my other phone for most things. After that everything worked fine and there were no other problems except that my 4G connection was very slow. When using 3G I have good speed (up to 10Mbps) which is good for my location. when switching to 4G, even sending a message will take a few minutes. and speed tests will fail with 0.05-0.01 Mbps. I could figure it out so I'm just using 3G, but maybe that's related?

Adrians:

I've given up trying to fix it so I need to backup and reset but I can't get Samsung Cloud to work, it says an error. Helium also doesn't work in most apps, and the smart switch says there's no app data to back up. Kies can't connect to my phone, and the smart switch on my computer keeps asking me to download its app from Google Play on my phone, even though it's there and working.

Alluvial:

I just created an account on this forum to answer this same problem. I understand that too. About a month ago I first received this error. I did some research online and only found 2-3 threads on the entire internet, so I figured this shouldn't be a common problem. I tried a few different things but the problem persisted so I decided to just format/reinstall (Samsung cloud backed up most of my settings and stuff which was great). It's been about 3-4 weeks and now the same error is back again! Does this mean I need to format/reinstall the phone every month? This seems a little funny. Things I tried: I tried formatting the SD card to exFAT, that didn't help. I tried deleting some unused apps, pictures/videos, etc. I tried formatting/reinstalling, this put the problem off, which eventually came back within a few weeks. I tried "force stopping" the Android system process, which helped for a while, but eventually the problem returned. A little disappointed that this problem doesn't come up often and there doesn't seem to be a real solution to it. Is this how they can force us to buy a better phone? My phone cost about $100. I got it like 2 years ago, Samsung J3 Duos, not the top of the line by any means, but it should work. I may have to buy a new phone if I can't solve this problem soon as I don't see any other easy solution.

Joestriker:

Hi guys, I also opened an account on this forum because I faced the same problem. This happened for the first time about 2 months ago when the phone was getting Android system notifications "Too many files etc" and my phone was getting slower and slower, basically unusable and I had to do a factory reset, and I thought that would be enough. I was wrong. That's it, today I start getting the same notification again so I'm not sure what to do next if a factory reset didn't fix the problem? Is this a hardware problem? Samsung S7 Edge phone. If anyone has any recommendations I would gladly appreciate it.

Pyralogue:

Hey guys, I had the same problem and was somehow able to get rid of it - not sure if I'm only solving it temporarily or if this is a permanent fix, so it would be great if anyone with this problem could test it and we'll see. I first saw this error about 2-3 weeks ago - I thought, "Okay, let's reset the phone to factory settings, it's still good to do this after a while." But this resolved the issue only for a very short time. It's back - and stronger than ever - my phone (Samsung J7) was lagging, I even had to remove the battery to force restart the phone several times when it froze.

Uninstalling most of my apps, bloatware, or wiping the phone using a tool in settings didn't help. So, before the last step - reinstalling the phone again - I tried to find updates in Settings - Software Update - Download Updates Manually (or something like that, my interface is not in English). After that the message disappeared and the phone started working again even if there was no update. IDK if this is a real solution or some kind of magic, but I still want to share my findings.

Joestriker:

It says the update I installed is the latest available

gamermaniac55:

So I'm trying to apply the solution suggested by Nilesh but can't find the force stop option? Maybe I'm a blind idiot. I have the same problem and it's driving me crazy.

landless83:

I have a Samsung j7 prime and would like to share my findings. I have tried all the solutions here in this post. None of them worked or they only worked for a few hours. I desperately tried the solution which worked for me and my phone was stable for these two days and it is still working. It might work for you too: I installed the Clean Master app and did everything it suggested I do to improve my phone. including deleting junk files...boosting RAM...battery and...if anyone tried this solution please let me know the results.

Jim Agnew:

Had the same problem with my Samsung S7 with android7, with random apps crashing, email not syncing, etc. Reset to factory defaults, but after a month the characters came back, so set about investigating the issue. My internal storage was 90% full (29GB/32GB) even though I didn't have many apps installed (90 in total). I have all my media such as photos, videos and music on the SD card.

File manager apps don't allow you to browse all folders (unless you root your device, but mine is still under warranty so there's no way). However, I found the culprit apps - the ping tools were using 3GB of data storage. When clearing it (in settings - applications) it took more than a minute. You can also sort apps by size, there was also a game assistant app (wtr assistant) using 11GB of storage. After cleaning and uninstalling these apps my s7 became stable. I wish there was a way to view all the data in a folder without rooting the device, as it would make troubleshooting these types of problems much easier. Just my 2 cents after 25 years as a system administrator.

gamermaniac55:

I will try. I'll try to post how things are going in the next couple of days.

gamermaniac55:

It worked temporarily, but now I'm forced to reset to factory settings for the 4th time this month.

Jim Agnew:

Hello gamermaniac55. The main cause of the error (at least on my samsung s7) is an application generating a lot of files... they may be small, but if there are too many, you will see a message: Too many files have been created on your computer. Telephone.

Check in settings - Applications - All applications - Sort by size. Please note that it may take a minute for the dimensions to be calculated for all applications. Any app larger than 500MB... or apps that increase in storage capacity daily can cause the problem. I can confirm as clearing storage data for the largest sized apps has now solved this problem for good. Good luck.

gamermaniac55:

I clear my apps cache and data every day and after about a week I still get them :/ I even tried installing a clean master app and using it twice a day but nothing. I'll try again and tell you what's going on

B. Diddy:

Oh my God, uninstall Clean Master and everything else from Cheetah right now. The latest in this company's long history of shady behavior.

Jim Agnew:

Well, I have news for you about a clean master for everyone who uses Samsung galaxy.

Jim Agnew:

Clean Master is integrated into Samsung Android 7 OS! Check in Settings - Device Maintenance - Storage.

B. Diddy:

I think they got rid of this on the newer phones. But then they switched to 360 Security, which is no better.

How can I block thumbnail creation?

To avoid permanently deleting the contents of the .thumbnails folder, follow these steps:

• Delete the .thumbnails folder and connect your smartphone to your PC.
• On your computer, create an empty text file and name it .thumbnails (make sure the folder name is correct).
• Next, this file is transferred to the phone in the DCIM folder.

Now saving thumbnails will stop because the system will not be able to create a new .thumbnails directive, since a folder with the same name already exists in the gadget. If for some reason this method did not work, follow the same steps, but instead of .thumbnails, name the empty text file .nomedia.

Checking free memory

You can find out how much memory is left through the built-in function. Most Samsung phones have a “My Files” folder (displayed in yellow). Clicking on it opens simplified access to the storage, divided into “Audio”, “Video”, “Documents”, “Downloads”, “Pictures”. Below under the categories is the “Device Memory” section. The slash indicates how much memory is used and how much memory is available on the phone.

On smartphones without such a folder counting function, you can find out the fill level through “Menu” - “Settings” - “Memory”. If space runs out, the gadget will highlight the line in red, showing the occupancy level. The RAM load cannot be checked using standard tools.

Memory card

The logical and simplest solution to problems with lack of memory is to buy a memory card (if your smartphone has an appropriate slot). When installing microSD on some devices, you will need to activate it, because by default the phone will continue to save files to the internal memory. Go to the “Memory/Storage” section and place a marker next to the “Memory Card” option.

It is also important to choose the right memory card - take into account the class and speed, as well as other characteristics. To avoid any discrepancies, carefully study our articles.

It should be noted that smartphones running the latest versions of Android have the ability to combine internal storage with a memory card. In such cases, the smartphone itself will offer to make a connection after installing the card.

conclusions

1. Do not keep unnecessary applications on your device: they fill up the main memory and consume battery power.

2. A memory card will not significantly free up space on your device from applications. The more applications you plan to download, the larger the built-in memory should be. For comfortable work, purchase devices with a memory capacity of at least 64 GB.

3. Store pictures, music and videos on a memory card if there is not enough space.

4. Memory cannot disappear on its own; this happens due to the increase in the volume of applications during their use.

Then what should you do if the Samsung A10 says file system limit? Here the solution suggests itself.

Try all the methods, gradually moving from simple to more complex. I will describe these methods, just to make it easier for you, first a few words about the origin of this damn error. The name somewhat speaks for itself. Limit means there is a lunch amount of something.

And what is there in the Samsung A10 file system in a certain amount? This is memory, but the system does not write which internal or operational memory.

He doesn't write because he doesn't know. Even Samsung employees don't know this. I communicated with them on and saved all this correspondence and posted it here. There is a lot of interesting stuff there for those who have a Samsung A10.

Let's get back to the topic. Going step by step to a logical conclusion, it turns out that it does not have enough memory and the system is forced to stop working. Here the first solution immediately arises.

NOTE: Empty the Trash. The fact is that you delete unnecessary files and they end up in the trash, but what is in the trash is actually in memory. This results in overflow.

Reset

The most radical method of solving all system problems is to completely format or reset the gadget to factory settings. This method is recommended for use in cases where simple ways to solve the problem have not brought the desired result.

To return your smartphone to factory settings, follow these steps:

1. Go to settings and select the “Backup and reset” option.
2. There are two options here: a reset without data loss and a reset together with a complete formatting of the drive. Choose the second option.
3. Next, click “Reset settings” and wait for the procedure to complete.

What does file system limit mean?

File system limit notification is a common complaint among Samsung Galaxy A10 phone users. To fix the problem, you need to understand what it is.

The file system limit is, in other words, a problem of full memory. A phone clogged with cache, images, various files and download materials may stop running applications and begin to work irregularly. In extreme cases, the device may stop turning on altogether. In the latter case, when other methods do not definitely solve the problem, it is necessary to resort to resetting the data, and therefore destroying it.

Let’s figure out what to do in other situations when it’s not “the end” yet, but the phone slows down, and the pop-up notification gets in the way and makes you nervous.

Using built-in device features

The first method does not require the user to download third-party applications from the Play Market, because the Android system has everything necessary to analyze and optimize the space used. Fine tuning will not be possible, but in 70% of cases such cleaning helps to identify and remove the main memory “eaters”.

1. Go to your smartphone's settings, then open the Storage section.
   

   Important! The “Memory” tab on devices from some manufacturers has a different name. For example: “Storage and USB drive.”

2. After a couple of seconds, detailed statistics on the use of internal storage will appear on the screen. The first thing you can do is remove unnecessary applications, and for the rest, clear the cache. Click on “App and file data” to go to the required section.
3. The screen will display a list of games and applications installed on your smartphone. Below the name of each program you can see how much space it fills. The most voracious in this regard are instant messengers and social network clients. Let's look at how to reduce the space occupied by an application by 2 or even 3 times.
4. Click on any application that is taking up a lot of memory. Information about the selected program will open; we are interested in the “Erase data” and “Clear cache” buttons.

The first step is to clear the cache - this action will not affect personal information in any way and will free up a couple of hundred megabytes in memory. But before you erase your data, remember:

If you erase app data, you will be signed out of your accounts and the photos and videos saved in your phone's memory will be lost. This especially applies to instant messengers - Viber, WhatsApp and Telegram.

The application itself will not disappear anywhere, so if you have accumulated a lot of unnecessary photos in your social network folders, you can safely erase the data.

The procedure can be carried out for several applications, resulting in freeing up from 200 to 600 MB of space.

How to get rid of a bug that causes Android to write that there is no space, although there is some

Sometimes situations happen when the phone literally goes crazy and starts giving an error like “No memory”. But when viewing the corresponding sections of the smartphone, it becomes clear that there is still a lot of free disk space, and it is pointless to cause the owner to panic with such messages. Of course, you can simply turn a blind eye to the problem, since this does not affect performance, but it is still better to correct the error.