If you are a user of brands like Realme, OPPO, Vivo, Xiaomi, and budget Samsung Phones, you might know that there are multiple bloatware in your phone, which even adds up to 30 or more unwanted apps. If you are anything like me and want a clean phone with the least amount of apps, Then this guide is for you, on how to debloat your android phone, using universal android debloater.
Android has evolved a lot from its initial days. Year after Year, google has been optimising Android, and now it has become a very good choice for anyone, from novice to pro users. The biggest advantage of android over its one and only major competitor, IOS Is that it is highly customisable, user friendly and most importantly, It is available in all price ranges. You can find an android phone that suits you, no matter what you want from it. Do you want long battery life? there is an android phone, Do you want a phone with a 4K display? there is an android phone.
But does this mean that android is the best OS, and android phones are without problems? Surely not. even though companies like Samsung ( and many other brands only on their high-end phones )provide users with polished, responsive and beautiful custom skins, with many functionalities, manufacturers often cut corners, especially in camera/ display, or supplement the cost by adding ads or including bloatware.
What is Bloatware?
Any app you don’t want to use, but is there anyways because the manufacturer added it for the sake of adding it, and is not necessary for the working of your phone, and could have been optional, is bloatware. so even though your phone and message apps are not counted as bloatware, many other apps such as browsers from OEMs, App stores, and apps which get automatically installed, like Facebook, uber Snapchat etc, are all bloatware. While most manufacturers ship their phones with bloatware, and even apple has some bloatware preinstalled, they are not always the same.
While having some pre-installed apps is not a sin, Apple allows you to delete almost all apps, even the ones that Apple ships, most Android manufacturers don’t allow that. The end-user has to suffer notifications and memory hogging from all those apps, which they have no use for, on a phone they paid for.
Why do manufacturers add Bloatware ?
The idea of a manufacturer adding bloatware that deliberately acts against the user’s interest might be surprising to many, but there are very well laid reasons for them doing so. While companies like Apple take a large profit ( they take as much as 40% profit per phone, compared to less than 5% of the cost per phone in the case of budget android phones), this is always the case. But these manufacturers should find ways to earn money, indirectly, so as to keep the business healthy.
They employ multiple methods like adding ADs inside OS, including affiliated start pages in chrome, adding sponsored apps, often crippling phones that are just 2 years old, in order to make the user buy a new phone. While the affiliate part and adding sponsored apps are not that bad, it might become an issue when there are a large number of them, in addition to an already existing number of OEM bloatware.
How to Remove Bloatware?
Removing Uninstallable Bloatware
Most OEMs install some third-party apps like Facebook, Snapchat, Moz, etc, that can easily be uninstalled like any other apps on the phone, simply long pressing the icon and clicking uninstall will do the job. One of the first pieces of advice we give to people who buy new gadgets, like mobile phones and laptops, like in this Guide on setting up a new laptop, is to remove all the unnecessary and uninstallable apps from your phone or laptop. So first, uninstall all the apps that you don’t need, either from the manufacturers or the ones you used a long time ago.
Removing OEM bloatware
These are apps like Fin-shell pay, clone phone, browser, etc from your OEM, which is not necessary for the normal functioning of your phone. But if you long-press these apps to uninstall them, you will not find any button to uninstall these apps. uninstalling these apps had been hard and with Risks in the past, but there is now software available for Windows, Linux, and MACOS with which you can easily remove bloatware, which is safe to remove, like Universal Android Debloater, with which you can remove all of the non-necessary OEM Apps, easily, without any issues.
How to Use Universal Android Debloater?
Turn on USB Debugging
- Go to about phone in the settings
- Scroll down to Build number and tap 10 times
- You will enable developer options
- go back to settings and search for ‘developer options’
- open developer options and go to ‘enable USB debugging and turn it on.
Install ADB on your laptop
- Download 15 second ADB
- Decompress it and install the 15 seconds ADB, along with the google driver when prompted
- Open it after installation
Connect your phone to your PC
- Connect your android phone to your PC/laptop via USB cable (MAKE SURE IT IS A GOOD QUALITY WIRE)
- Take ADB and type ‘ adb devices ‘
- A popup will come on your mobile phone. check the box and press allow
- now your device should be listed (some random letters, not the name of your phone.)
Remove Bloatware
- Connect the phone to the PC
- Open the UAD app
- Hit refresh if your device Is not showing
- Ensure that the mode is set to recommended and safe
- Check on the app to delete/disable and press
- press uninstall
Just keep the app selection to recommended, and uninstall all the apps that you don’t need. For more info, read the Github page. you can Download Universal android Debloater from here.
A word of caution: apart from the ability to remove non-harmful apps, it also allows users to remove likely harmful/ crippling functionality apps as well. for example, removing the weather app 2 from oppo phones will disable the lock screen ( how can you make a lock screen without the weather app ), and so if you are not an enthusiast, then you should refrain from using it. but if you want to, try changing the app selection from recommended to advanced.
Benefits of Removing Bloatware
- More available Free RAM
- More Battery Backup
- Less clutter
- More Beautifull UI
- Better privacy ( who doesn’t like privacy?)
- much better performance and free storage in old phones
Is it Safe?
Well, there is no 100% guarantee that everything will be all right, and that your phone would be fully functional afterward, but I have Debloated a couple of phones from different OEMs using the universal android debloater, and none of them had any side effects ( I tinkered with expert settings in al of them and managed to disable lock screen of oppo, as I said earlier, but just re-enabling it corrected that issue.)
So it is safe to assume that it will be harmless mostly, and it is up to you to consider taking the risk.
Alternative way?
If you do not want to take risks, even if it is 5%, but still want a better experience, don’t worry, we have got you covered. the simple and easy method is to install a third-party launcher, like the lean launcher. a launcher is often called your home screen, and it is with the launcher that you interact while opening apps/ on the home screen. Will installing a launcher remove the bloatware? No. But you can hide all the bloatware from showing up on your app list, and also make your use more smooth and more fluid. besides all this, you will get a large set of customizations and tweaks too.
Want to try out some launchers? go to the play store and search for the launcher, or check out the free and add-free launchers that we personally used, and recommend:
Best Android Launchers without ADS
- Lean launcher ( Pixel like UI )
- Hyperion launcher ( Material UI )
- Nova launcher (Minimalistic )
Hope this guide helped you. If you face any difficulties, don’t hesitate to contact us, and we are glad to help you resolve any issue that you might encounter.