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Common Android Problems and Their Solutions
1. WiFi Keep Disconnecting
Your Android phone may start disconnecting from WiFi either while using the phone or when it goes to sleep. And as a result, there will be a delay in messages and notifications. Android does this to save battery life, but it’s not for everyone. So, here’s how to solve this problem:
Go to “Settings” and then tap on “WiFi”. Now tap on the main menu button at the top-right corner and select “Advanced”. You should see the option of “Keep Wi-Fi on during sleep”, make sure it is set to “Always”.
If you are still getting the same problem, make sure to turn OFF Scanning always available option in the Advanced Wi-Fi setting. Because, when this option is turned ON, your phone’s Wi-Fi keeps looking for better connection and try to connect to that.
This will ensure you are not disconnected from WiFi when the phone goes to sleep. In case your phone is disconnecting from WiFi while using the phone, then most probably it is a problem with your router. First, try restarting the router. If this doesn’t solve it, then you will have to get a new router; there might be a problem with the antenna of the current router. Recently I faced the same problem with my very old router, and a free router switch from my ISP solved the problem (and few others as well.)
2. WiFi Showing but not Connecting
There is a chance your network may show in the list of near WiFi networks, but nothing happens when you select it. This can be easily solved by forgetting the network and reconnecting to it using the WiFi password.
Go to “Settings” and tap on “WiFi”. Here tap and hold on your network from the list and select “Forget network”. Now tap on your network again to connect to it.
3. Insufficient Storage Available
Sooner or later you are going to run out of space on your Android phone. And this is most irritating when you are installing an Android app. Thankfully you can quickly gain back some storage (300-500 MB) by clearing the device’s cache. To start off, open the “Settings” app and navigate to the “Storage and USB > Internal Storage” section next tap on the “Cached data” option, you will see a confirmation window. Simply tap on the button “Ok” and you are good to go.
This will get you going for now, however, to clear more space, check out our editor Vamsi’s article on how to free up space on your Android device.
4. SD Card not Working
Your phone may stop recognizing your SD card or may not show the data inside it. Usually, this happens when the SD card is not properly inserted or it’s corrupted/infected. Take out the SD card and put it back inside properly. If this doesn’t fix the problem, then put the SD card in some other device to check if there is the problem with the SD card or your SD card slot. If that doesn’t help as well, then you will have to format your SD card. Of course, this will delete all the data inside the SD card. You should back up important data inside the SD card by connecting it to a PC using an SD card reader. While still connected to the PC, right-click on the SD card and select “Format” to delete all the data. Alternatively, if your phone is accepting the SD card but not showing its data, then you can also format it from inside the phone. From the phone settings, tap on “Storage” and then tap on “Erase SD card” or “Format SD card” to delete all the data. You can even use a file manager app to do this.
5. Battery Draining Too Fast
Short battery life is one the biggest issues of smartphones, and Android phones aren’t an exception. Most smartphones are meant to last a single day, if you are not getting that much, then there is some problem. Usually, the biggest culprit is some apps ( like Google Services or Facebook) running in the background and draining your battery even when your phone is in the sleep mode. A quick way to fix this is reboot your phone, generally, this will force close the misbehaving apps. If that doesn’t work, then go to Settings > Battery > scroll down till you see Usage since last full charge and force close the misbehaving apps.
This will give you quick relief, but for a detail breakthrough, check out these simple Android battery saving tips to get the most juice out of your phone’s battery.
6. Android Keyboard Too Slow or Not Working
A very common Android problem is the keyboard taking few seconds just to show up or not show at all. Usually, this happens when you are using a third-party keyboard that is less stable. If you are using one, then I will recommend you to uninstall it and try using the default Android keyboard that is more stable. Fortunately, Google recently replaced stock Google Keyboard with “Gboard” that is much more functional and arguably better than most third-party Android keyboards. If you are not comfortable with this switch or facing this problem with the default keyboard, then simply deleting its cache or data should fix the problem. Go to “Apps” from phone settings and open the keyboard app. Here tap on “Clear Cache” and see if it fixes the problem. If not, then tap on “Clear Data” to reset the app to factory condition, which should fix the problem (at least for now).
Warning: Deleting keyboard data will delete all your downloaded languages and your personal dictionary. Make sure this data is backed up in the cloud.
7. Slow User Interface Along with Occasional Freezes
The biggest cause of UI slowdown is too much data inside the phone and especially the SD card. My first suggestion would be to delete all the cache. Go to “Storage” from phone settings and tap on “Clear cache” to delete all the cache.
If this doesn’t fix the problem, then take out the SD card and try using the phone. Usually, this is due to slow read/write speed of the SD card that is filled with tons of data (this worked for me, just so you know). If it fixes the problem, then backup SD data somewhere else and try to empty it as much as possible. If phone memory is near full as well, then try the tips in the #3 Android problem in this list to free up space.
8. Can’t Download Apps from Google Play Store
Simply deleting Google Play Store app’s cache and data should help solve this problem. Follow the instructions in the problem #6 in this list to clear both cache and user data of Google Play Store. If this doesn’t solve the problem, then go to “Accounts” from the phone settings and delete your connected Google account. Now launch Google Play Store again and fill in the account details. This reset should solve any authentication problems that may be stopping you from downloading apps.
9. Locked Out of Android Phone
If you have forgotten your lock screen password, then there are two ways to get inside the phone depending on your Android OS version. Below is the explanation: Android 4.4 Kitkat and Below Devices If your phone is running Android 4.4 and below Android version, then simply make wrong password attempts 5 times. You should see an option of “Forgot Password” after the 5th attempt. Tap on it and provide your connected Google account details to reset the lock screen. Android 5.0 Lollipop and Above Devices Unfortunately, Android 5.0 and above version of Android is more secure and won’t give you an option to recover your password. You will have to factory reset your device from outside the phone to remove the lock screen password. This will delete all your data in the process, so if you don’t have a backup already, there is nothing you can now. If your phone is still connected to WiFi, then you can go to “Android Device Manager” website to remotely reset your device. However, if it is offline, then you will have to go to your phone’s “Recovery mode” to reset it. Every Android phone has a different method to access the recovery mode, so you will have to search online for the method to access it in your particular Android phone. Once inside the recovery mode, use volume keys to reach the “Wipe phone” option and press the power button to factory reset the phone.
10. Particular App Suddenly Crashing or not Working Properly
Whenever an app starts misbehaving, it’s usually due to corrupt or overloaded cache. Simply delete the cache like we did above and it should work fine. If that doesn’t solve the problem, then you will have to delete its “Data” to make it behave. However, deleting data will delete all user configurations and anything downloaded inside the app (basically factory resetting it). You should ensure that the data is backed up in the cloud before deleting the data. There is also a chance an update may have made the app buggy or incompatible with your device. You can either wait until the app is fixed or sideload an older (working) version of the app from any popular APK website, such as APKMirror.
11. How To Clear Data Usage History
Android keeps track of all your mobile data usage to let you know how much data you have used so far. However, there is no button to clear this data in case you want to reset the data and start over. If you are looking to reset data usage on your Android phone, check out our article on how to clear data usage on Android.
12. Bootloop on Android Smartphone
This one is the most serious problem. Your device got stuck in the starting screen or restart again and again. This usually happens, if you tinker with your devices a lot, flash different ROM, etc. But sometimes it’s the manufacturer fault or just happens randomly. To fix this issue, you have to boot into your phone’s recovery and Wipe Cache partition including the Dalvik cache. The steps are different for each device, beyond the scope of this article, however, you can get a good idea from this post on How to Fix Bootloop on Android Smartphone.
13. Voice to text option missing in Gboard
Google voice to text is a god sent for writers like us. Great ideas come when I’m walking in the park, or just laying down in my bed and when that happens, I use Google text to voice to quickly write it down. But after a recent update from Google Keyboard to Gboard, the voice-to-text was gone. Initially, I thought Google has removed this feature, but after a bit of tinker, I got it back. Make sure Google app is installed and update. Now go to Settings > Language & Input > Current Keyboard > Choose Keyboard > Enable Google Voice Typing.
Rounding Up
I believe low storage, WiFi connectivity issues and battery draining too fast are the most common Android problems in this list. If you use the device wisely, then these problems can be easily solved. Do let us know in the comments which common Android problems you most bump in.
