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Yesterday, Qian Chui Ge talked about several major reasons for slow computer startup, hoping to help everyone. Today, we will discuss the reasons why Android phones slow down over time from three aspects: hardware, system, and software.
Mobile phones are electronic products, and their main internal components are composed of semiconductors and conductors. Over time, aging phenomena will definitely occur, which is a common issue for all electronic products, not just Android phones, including Apple phones, computers, and even your TV set-top box.
The most aging component is the NAND flash storage unit. The role of the flash storage unit in mobile phones is similar to that of an SSD solid-state drive in computers, responsible for data storage.
As we all know, the speed of a computer’s solid-state drive slows down with usage time and the number of write operations. In fact, the storage unit in mobile phones is the same as the SSD in computers, and it will also slow down with increased usage time.
As we all know, the Android system is produced by Google. However, Google has shared the source code, so most Android phone brands use this source code, add some nice skins, and create their own systems such as MIUI, Flyme, ColorOS, Smartisan OS, etc. But they all use the same underlying thing, which is Google’s Android source code. Google is the parent, and the other Android phone manufacturers’ systems are the children dressed in beautiful clothes.
As mentioned earlier, Android phone manufacturers’ systems are all patched versions of the native Android source code, removing Google services (which can’t be accessed anyway), adding their own services (app market, cloud services, etc.), and then modifying the font and menu order of the interface to create their own system. In the industry, there is a specific term for this—Launcher.
Therefore, the phone lag that you can feel is mainly due to the lagging of the Launcher, manifested as less smooth desktop sliding and a slow response when entering system menu settings.
The lag in this aspect is mainly determined by the single-core performance of the phone’s Soc processor, which is why flagship chip phones feel smoother and more responsive than those with ordinary chips.
In this regard, processors with Cortex-A73/A72 architecture, such as Kirin 970/960, Snapdragon 835/820/660, are stronger than those with Cortex-A53 architecture (e.g., Snapdragon 625/630, Helio P20/P23/P30), and of course, this is also reflected in the price of the phone.
However, with years of optimization by phone manufacturers, even entry-level processors like Helio P10 and Snapdragon 435 can ensure smooth performance. If your new phone experiences lag at the Launcher level, Qian Chui Ge suggests trying a third-party Launcher, such as Nova Launcher or Holo Launcher.
From the moment we click the APP icon to launch until the complete main interface of the APP is displayed, the duration varies among different phones, and this issue is mainly due to NAND flash.
NAND Flash Performance Ranking is as follows: (UFS2.1 > UFS2.0 > eMMC5.x > eMMC4.x).
And Memory Bandwidth Performance Ranking is as follows: (LPDDR4X > LPDDR4 > LPDDR3; high-end processors generally support four-channel memory, while entry-level processors only support single-channel).
Phones using higher-grade flash and memory naturally have faster APP launches.
Additionally, like computers, phones with larger memory can also launch APPs faster because they can keep APPs in the background. Phones with smaller memory cannot accommodate so many APPs simultaneously, leading to the need to clear some background APPs, which means they have to reload next time, and of course, that is not as fast as directly switching.
For example, the Meizu S6, equipped with the Exynos 7872 processor, has a GPU model of Mali-G71MP1, but its frame rate when playing “Honor of Kings” is comparable to many high-end phones. The reason is that the Meizu S6 has a screen resolution of only HD+ (1440×720 pixels), which puts far less rendering pressure on the GPU than mid-high-end phones with FHD+ (2160×1080 pixels) screens. This is similar to computers; an NVIDIA GTX1050Ti graphics card can run smoothly at 1080P resolution, but when switched to 4K resolution, it struggles to perform well.
Taking “Honor of Kings” as an example, the OPPO R11/R15 performs better than other phones with the same Snapdragon 660 or even Snapdragon 835 chips, maintaining a stable 60fps. However, when playing games like “Honkai Impact 3”, the OPPO R11/R15’s performance is far inferior to that of phones using Snapdragon 835 chips. The main reason is that the game developer of “Honor of Kings” has conducted joint optimizations with the phone manufacturer OPPO for the R11/R15.
When the phone temperature reaches a certain set value, the processor must reduce its frequency to protect itself from overheating. If you play games while charging, it is easier to overheat, increasing the chances of processor lag. When selecting a high-end phone, the quality of heat dissipation should also be a consideration.
The previous “slowdown gate” of Apple phones was caused by system updates that reduced the running speed of old iPhones. Old iPhones could only restore smooth performance after replacing the battery and downgrading the iOS system. Therefore, Apple’s “slowdown gate” was considered a conspiracy.
Similarly, if Android phones feel slower after upgrading to a new system, you can try downgrading back to the original system.
Before 2013, most apps primarily focused on a single function without any extra features.
However, over time, these apps slowly added features like news push, friend additions, video viewing, bullet comments, shopping, etc., consuming more and more resources.
For example, earlier versions of WeChat might only occupy 150MB of space and 200MB of memory, but the latest version of WeChat can occupy several GB of space and 600MB of memory after running for a while.
In other words, a year ago, your phone could run four specific apps smoothly at the same time, but now running the latest versions of those four apps simultaneously may lead to lag due to insufficient memory.
Additionally, Android users often encounter the issue where, even after clearing background programs, they receive sudden news from a news app, promotional ads from an e-commerce store, or financial news from a banking app, even though they were just using WeChat and had not opened those apps! The problem is that app manufacturers need to profit, so they almost all integrate message push functions and can wake themselves up through other apps.
The operations of these apps in the background are: when opening app A, it additionally opens a channel to help wake up app B; when app B is awakened, it also opens an additional channel because app C wants to send an ad through app B’s channel…
Thus, Android apps are often interlinked, and the precious memory of the phone is consumed little by little, leading to additional battery consumption, overheating, frequency reduction, and ultimately resulting in lag.
As Qian Chui Ge mentioned yesterday about the computer software bundle, the main reasons for Android phones slowing down over time are largely due to increasingly feature-rich and bloated apps (the software bundle) and various app collaborations leading to resource consumption.
To address this issue, we can manually disable notifications, auto-start, and interlinked wake-up permissions for infrequently used apps, which will significantly improve system smoothness. Qian Chui Ge recommends using the apps “Green Guardian” or “Black Domain” to block these functions.
This concludes the discussion on why Android phones slow down over time. If you find this useful, remember to like, share, and comment.
Qian Chui Ge has written over 100 articles on computer knowledge, and you can browse them on the public account:
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