If you believe your iPhone and iPad have been getting slower over time, you’re probably right. The decline in speed happens so gradually that it’s almost imperceptible, but one day you realize that your apps are responding slowly, menus are sluggish, and Safari is taking forever to load simple websites. In this article, I’ll explain the real reasons why your iPhone is so slow and show you the fixes that will make your iPhone, iPad, or iPod run as fast as possible.
The Real Reasons Why Your iPhone Is So SlowAll of the fixes I describe in this article work equally well for iPhones, iPads, and iPods, because they all run Apple’s iOS operating system. As we’ll discover, it’s software, not hardware, that is the root of the problem.
1. Your iPhone Is Out Of Available Storage Spaceno available storage for iphoneLike all computers,
iPhones have a limited amount of storage space. The current iPhones come in 16 GB, 64 GB, and 128 GB varieties. (GB stands for gigabyte, or 1000 megabytes). Apple refers to these storage amounts as the iPhone’s “ capacity”, and in this respect, and iPhone’s capacity is like the size of a hard drive on a Mac or PC.
After you’ve owned your iPhone for a while and taken lots of pictures, downloaded music, and installed a bunch of apps, it’s easy to run out of available memory.
Problems begin to occur when the amount of available storage space reaches 0. I’m going to avoid a technical discussion at this point, but suffice to say that all computers need a little bit of “wiggle room” to keep the software running smoothly.
How Do I Check How Much Free Space Is Available On My iPhone?Head to Settings -> General -> About and look at the number to the right of Available. If you have more than a few gigabytes available, skip to the next step — this isn’t the problem.
check available storage space on iphone
How Much Memory Should I Leave Available On My iPhone?
The iPhone is a very memory-efficient device. In my experience, you don’t need much available memory to keep things running smoothly. My advice to avoid a slow iPhone is this: Keep 500 MB free at the very least, and 1 GB free if you’d like to be totally safe.
How Can I Free Up Memory On My iPhone?Fortunately, it’s easy to track down what’s taking up space on your iPhone. Head to Settings -> General -> iPhone Storage and you’ll see a descending list of what’s taking up the most space on your iPhone.
view storage space on iphonePhotos have to be deleted using the Photos app, iTunes or Finder, but Music and Apps can easily be removed from this screen. For apps, just tap on the name of the app and tap Delete App. For Music, swipe your finger from right to left on the items you’d like to delete, and tap Delete.
You can quickly optimize your iPhone storage by enabling some of the features underneath the Recommendations submenu. For example, if you enable Auto Delete Old Conversations, your iPhone will automatically delete any messages or attachments that you sent or received over a year ago.
2. All Your Apps Are Loaded In Memory At Once (And You Don’t Know It)lots of apps running on iphoneWhat happens if you open a whole bunch of programs at the same time on your Mac or PC? Everything slows down. Your iPhone is no different. I’ve covered this point in other articles, including my article about how to save iPhone battery life , but it’s necessary to address here as well.
In reality, even after you leave an app, that app stays loaded into your iPhone’s RAM. As I mentioned above, the iPhone memory manages extremely well, but having lots of apps open at the same time can cause your iPhone to slow down.
Which Apps Are Suspended On My iPhone? And How Do I Close Them?To view the apps that are suspended in memory on your iPhone, double-click the Home button and you’ll see the Multitasking view. If your iPhone doesn’t have a Home button, swipe up from the bottom to the center of the screen and hold your finger there until the Multitasking view opens.
To close an app, use your finger to swipe it up and off the top of the screen. This doesn’t delete the app, but it does clear the app from suspended memory on your iPhone.
I recommend closing all your apps at least once every few days to keep things running smoothly.
close app store on iphoneI’ve seen iPhones with dozens of apps suspended in memory, and clearing them out makes a huge difference. Show your friends, too! If they didn’t know all their apps were still loaded in memory, they’ll be grateful for your help.
check for updates to apps You Need To Update Your iPhoneupdating the latest software of an iphoneHead to Settings -> General -> Software Update, and if there’s a software update available, download and install it.
check background app refresh on iphoneI don’t recommend turning off Background App Refresh, entirely because as we said before, allowing certain apps to run in the background is most definitely a good thing. Instead, ask yourself this question for each app:“Do I need this app to alert me or send me messages when I’m not using it?”
If the answer is no, then I’d recommend turning off Background App Refresh for that specific app. Go down through the list, and if you’re like me, you’ll only have a select few apps left on by the very end .
To learn more about this function, Apple’s support article about Multitasking and Background App Refresh has some good information. Be aware, however, that support articles on Apple’s website tend to be written from an idealistic perspective, whereas I take a more pragmatic approach.
Turn Your iPhone Off And Back On Againturning off an iphoneCan simply rebooting your iPhone make that much of a difference? Yes! Especially if you’ve completed all of the previous steps, turning off your iPhone purges the iPhone’s memory and gives it a fresh, clean start.