How to Rid Your Phone of Those Default Apps You Never Use

Bloat­ware doesn’t sound plea­sant, but it’s a fairly mild condi­tion: It’s those apps that come preins­ta­lled on your smartp­hone that you defi­ni­tely didn’t ask for and probably don’t want. They’re often used by manu­fac­tu­rers to push their own apps and servi­ces on top of (or instead of) what the smartp­hone offers by default.

The term was origi­nally used to refer to Windows compu­ters, which could come with a long list of third-party utili­ties and soft­ware suites on top of Windows itself, depen­ding on who you bought the compu­ter from. The situ­a­tion has impro­ved in recent years, but even today you can open up a brand-new Windows laptop and find your­self running trial versi­ons of a half-dozen diffe­rent apps, utili­ties, anti­vi­rus, and office tools.

While the vast majo­rity of bloat­ware won’t actu­ally do anyt­hing harm­ful, these unwan­ted apps take up storage space and system resour­ces that could be used by apps that you actu­ally do want to use. They can also be confu­sing, leaving you with multi­ple apps on your phone that all do the same job.

From a secu­rity and privacy stand­po­int, it’s a good idea to remove bloat­ware apps that you’re not using. How you go about this will depend on the phone you’re using.

Bloat­ware is a much more common problem on Android phones because there are so many more phone­ma­kers putting out Android devi­ces. In some cases, you can find your­self with a dozen apps or more that you don’t really want or need (though the manu­fac­tu­rers them­sel­ves will be keen for you to give them a try).

To get rid of any app from your Android phone, bloat­ware or other­wise, open up Settings and choose Apps and noti­fi­ca­ti­ons, then See all apps. If you’re sure you can do without somet­hing, select the app then choose Unins­tall to have it remo­ved.

In some cases, you won’t be able to comple­tely remove an app because of the way the manu­fac­tu­rer has inte­gra­ted it into its own version of Android. If this is the case, look for an option labe­led Disa­ble instead of Unins­tall—this will at least prevent the app from running, using up vital system resour­ces, and getting in your way.

The process may differ slightly depen­ding on the make and model of your phone and the version of Android that you’re running, but if you head to the main Settings app you should be able to remove or disa­ble apps easily enough, leaving you with a phone that’s a little less weig­hed down by unwan­ted junk.

As we’ve said, some Android phone makers will preins­tall apps that can’t be remo­ved through the usual method. If you want to comple­tely remove apps rather than disa­bling them, or you come across bloat­ware that can’t even be disa­bled, then a couple of more advan­ced and invol­ved opti­ons are open to you.

The first is to install the Android Studio deve­lo­per tool on a Windows or macOS compu­ter—you’ll find the down­lo­ads on this page. Your phone also needs to be put into deve­lo­per mode, which you can do by going to About Phone in Settings and tapping Build Number seven times: This will reveal a new Deve­lo­per Opti­ons menu in the System section of Settings, in which you need to enable USB debug­ging. (There’s no harm in doing this, but it does open up a number of new opti­ons you should take care using, if you expe­ri­ment with them.)

You’re now ready to connect your phone up to your compu­ter via USB and get to work. Once the connec­tion is physi­cally in place, you need to open a PowerS­hell (Windows) or Termi­nal (macOS) window from the Android Studio folder where the Android Debug Bridge (ADB) is insta­lled—on Windows you would head to C:\ Users\ <user>\ AppData\ Local\ Android\ Sdk\ plat­form-tools (where «<user>» is your Windows user account name), Shift+­right-click inside the folder and choose Open PowerS­hell window here.

With the PowerS­hell or termi­nal window open, run the command «.\adb devi­ces» to initi­ate the link and then «adb shell» to get control of the connec­ted Android device (on a Mac you don’t need the prece­ding «.\»). The final command you need is «pm unins­tall -k—user 0 <appname>», with "<appname> the package name of the app you want to get rid of: You can use the free App Inspec­tor on your phone to find these package names.

That’s a brief, whistle-stop tour of what is quite a compli­ca­ted and tech­ni­cal process. If you’re seri­ous enough about remo­ving bloat­ware in this way, we’d recom­mend rese­ar­ching details for your parti­cu­lar phone model and reading more about ADB first, as well as consul­ting the exce­llent XDA Deve­lo­pers guide to the process (you might also find guides custo­mi­zed to your speci­fic phone).

The second way to compre­hen­si­vely pull out bloat­ware is to root your phone. As with ADB, this requi­res a little bit of tech­ni­cal know-how, but it’ll also void your hand­set’s warranty and intro­duce a (small) risk of bric­king your device. It’s a lot of trou­ble to go to to remove some unwan­ted apps, but the option is there if you need it.

If you think rooting is for you, it will give you full control over your phone and it’s soft­ware. Again, XDA Deve­lo­pers has a detai­led and compre­hen­sive guide for all kinds of Android phones, and once you’ve modi­fied your phone in this way you’ll be able to make use of apps like Root App Dele­ter or System App Remo­ver to get rid of unwan­ted apps.

iPho­nes have much less of a problem with bloat­ware, because it’s only Apple that makes it (Yes, the iPhone, and all the pre-insta­lled apps that come with one.) You could argue that some of Apple’s less neces­sary apps match the defi­ni­tion of bloat­ware, but you defi­ni­tely don’t get any third-party, largely useless apps that you weren’t expec­ting in advance.

Some of those pre-insta­lled, stock apps—­like Safari and Messa­ges—­can’t be remo­ved, but since iOS 10 laun­ched in 2016, Apple has allo­wed users to remove a lot of the stock apps if they don’t need them. The apps you can get rid of include Calcu­la­tor, Calen­dar, Compass, Contacts, Face­Time, Home, iBooks, iCloud Drive, iTunes Store, Mail, Maps, Music, News, Notes, Podcasts, Remin­ders, Stocks, Tips, Videos, Voice Memos, Watch and Weat­her.

To remove any of these apps, do the same as you would with a third-party app: Long press on the icon, then choose Delete App from the menu that appe­ars. You’ll then be shown a confir­ma­tion window, so hit Delete to finish the process. If you need any of these apps again in the future, you can find them in the App Store.

In some cases remo­ving the app won’t remove the asso­ci­a­ted func­ti­o­na­lity, which is actu­ally built into iOS itself. Delete Face­Time, for exam­ple, and you can still make and receive Face­Time calls through the Phone app. The Phone app also keeps hold of your contact list even if you delete the actual Contacts app.