Until the end of August 2026, all Android phone backups will count towards the available Google storage space. When the space is full, the phone will stop making new backups until the user frees up enough space.
The extra data should only take up between 30 and 60 MB, but careful tweaking of your backups can free up hundreds of megabytes or even gigabytes of space.
Settings are in the menu Settings > Accounts and backup > Google backup. The data is divided into three categories: Photos and videos, Documents i Other device data.
The last category includes SMS and MMS messages, call history, device settings and application data. This information is important because without it, restoring your phone from a backup will not restore messages, settings, and content saved in apps. However, it is not necessary for every application to store all data in the cloud.
Duplicate photos and videos consume the most available Google space
By turning off data backup copies of individual applications, it is possible to free up several hundred megabytes. Some apps store tens of megabytes of data even though they only contain payment information or easily re-downloadable content.
The biggest space savings, however, come from changing the settings for photos and videos. Google Photos can automatically save content from all folders on your phone, including pictures and videos downloaded by messaging apps.
WhatsApp, for example, downloads a copy of every open photo or video to the phone, while simultaneously making its own backup of conversations and media files to a Google account. If WhatsApp folder saving is enabled in the Google Photos app, the same content can be saved twice.
In a specific example, the phone accumulated more than one gigabyte of WhatsApp photos and videos in just one month. Without regular deletion and with both backups turned on, the app could take up to 24GB over the course of a year, although an actual backup needs roughly 8 to 12GB.
By excluding the WhatsApp folder from the Google Photos backup copy, it is possible to save between 8 and 12 GB per year, without losing important data. The same applies to other applications that store images on the phone.
Viewing the folders automatically saved by Google Photos, turning off unnecessary app data and occasionally deleting duplicate content can free up several gigabytes of Google space, without compromising messages, documents and device settings, advises 9to5Google.