Does Android still bog down over time?

[Shadrack]

It doesn't help when our expectation for performance keeps increasing over time. It seems to be a pretty common problem people have with technology. My 2 year old phone always seems bogged down and slower than my new phone. My new phone is nice and zippy and everything works wonderfully. It will work the exact same way in 2 years, but my expectations will be different.

There could be more to it than that (amount of apps installed, and I wonder if the device's flash memory slows down after so many read/write cycles).

Yeah, I've heard the bit about iOS multitasking - IIRC apps can request to run for up to 10 minutes after they've been "closed" (brought out of focus), and they can only register to receive / display Push notifications past that limit. I'm not entirely sure if I see the benefit of having an app actually running perpetually in the background, though. Then again, I'll freely admit that my ability to think outside the box for these things is quite limited.

I wish it was easy to use the stock UI while still having display enhancements like the BRAVIA Engine and such - from my understanding they bake it into the kernel or other system files...

I guess I'll wait for the phone to come out and get someone to tell me the kernel it's running at and such before making a decision. My contract doesn't expire until the 26th of March anyway.

I'm no expert, but it seems like newer Android apps in 4.2 behave very similarly to iOS apps when it comes to multitasking. That is apps in the background disappear from memory when they haven't been accessed for some time and have to be reloaded. There are probably lots of different things going on under the hood.

iOS no doubt has a stricter multitasking API. I think only apps specifically designated as being used for navigation or VoIP are able to truly operate in the background.

[yowanvista]

Yeah, I've heard the bit about iOS multitasking - IIRC apps can request to run for up to 10 minutes after they've been "closed" (brought out of focus), and they can only register to receive / display Push notifications past that limit. I'm not entirely sure if I see the benefit of having an app actually running perpetually in the background, though. Then again, I'll freely admit that my ability to think outside the box for these things is quite limited.

I wish it was easy to use the stock UI while still having display enhancements like the BRAVIA Engine and such - from my understanding they bake it into the kernel or other system files...

I guess I'll wait for the phone to come out and get someone to tell me the kernel it's running at and such before making a decision. My contract doesn't expire until the 26th of March anyway.

The Xperia Z is a true powerhouse, you should go for it imho. The OS/kernel won't be a problem and you'll have a Jelly Bean 4.2 upgrade soon afterwards. It uses kernel 3.4, the same version used in the Nexus 4 and Xperia T.

That is apps in the background disappear from memory when they haven't been accessed for some time and have to be reloaded. There are probably lots of different things going on under the hood.

This has always been the case, inactive background Apps which are no longer used will automatically be killed after some time though they will still appear in the recent apps window hence require reloading if switched to. Active background apps will remain in memory unless the device runs out of RAM, in that case the memory manager will start terminating them starting with the low priority background processes.

[a.mcdear]

Generally speaking, its app updates that tend to cause Android to slow down. Sometimes fixing the problem is as easy as wiping the dalvik cache and letting the apps be re-optimized on the next boot. The issue is similar to slow downs caused by Windows registry fragmentation that used to plague Windows XP.

[Ryoken]

I've had no end of problems with my Nexus 7.. lots of random reboots, crashes, sometimes it'll just sit there rebooting for hrs.. and that's with it relatively clean, as I nuked it not that long ago.

[Titoist]

My Android 4.0.3 on Sony Tablet S slows down over the course of 6 months. I have had to reinstall it once already. Luckily for me, my Google Account does the backups so when I signed in, everything came back. Just had to reinstall several programs. Reinstall took about 15min.

[+Eternal Tempest MVC]

I've had no end of problems with my Nexus 7.. lots of random reboots, crashes, sometimes it'll just sit there rebooting for hrs.. and that's with it relatively clean, as I nuked it not that long ago.

Have you tried re-loading from the Google Factory Image?

https://developers.google.com/android/nexus/images

[xendrome]

<If problem happens to you, it must be default be happening to everyone else on planet>

I've never seen this issue and have used a multitude of devices from Android 1.6 up to current.

[srbeen]

The software can depending on how much your carrier screwed with it. The beauty of Android is you can flash something like CM10 or MIUI or AOSP or AOKP roms and get more...

[Belazor]

<If problem happens to you, it must be default be happening to everyone else on planet>

I've never seen this issue and have used a multitude of devices from Android 1.6 up to current.

Not sure if that was directed at me - if so, I think you must have missed the promotional video for Project Butter where they showed how the UI used to lag. My issue was basically the same, only it got progressively worse as time went on until the phone became literally unusable as a phone.

If I had asked "does Project Butter work as advertised?" I bet I would have gotten a lot more "yes my phone is fine" posts and less posts like yowanvista's posts that helped me gain an understanding as to what exactly is going on and why it's much less likely to be an issue on today's kernel / hardware.

That's not to say I don't value people saying their phone is fine - I do, it's always good to hear that it's not an issue affecting 100% of users. But it's also nice to hear from people saying "my <phone comparatively aged to mine> used to do this but once I got one with decent amounts of RAM it's been fine" since that inspires confidence :)

The software can depending on how much your carrier screwed with it. The beauty of Android is you can flash something like CM10 or MIUI or AOSP or AOKP roms and get more...

I've always de-branded my phones - Manufacturer's flaky update schedules are bad enough, I don't need my carrier slowing it down further ;)

But then again, the beauty of iOS is that once I see on Engadget a new iOS version is out, I can get it too, and it's always OTA as well :)

[Ryoken]

Have you tried re-loading from the Google Factory Image?

https://developers.g...id/nexus/images

Yes.

I also get random crashes, even with stock apps.. like Chrome..

Though since I got an iPad Mini, I haven't really messed with all that much.. I really should RMA it and see if maybe it's hardware..

[Ambroos]

The problem usually is that you keep on stacking up new apps and more apps that keep doing more in the background. Doing a clean install every X months isn't such a bad idea.

In general Android is pretty robust though. I've had an Arc, Arc S, Neo, S and T for quite a while and with every generation the effect got much less bad. Before switching to the T I'd been using the S for about 6 months without a reinstall and it really did fine. No slowdowns at all.

I've now also placed my pre-order for the Xperia Z :) It looks like a kickass phone, and with 2GB RAM you just can't go wrong.

[ANON86364]

I started off with in Android with a Nexus One, then a Samsung Galaxy S, then a Galaxy Note. All without much issue. Any issues I have had were attributed to bad ROM developers. Just had to find a suitable ROM and it's been smooth sailing. Even my Nexus One has ICS on it. Haven't tried to put JB on it yet.

[ViperAFK]

I had a Droid DNA for about a week, and Android bogged down so badly on the "Worlds most powerful superphone" that I got rid of it. It was bad enough everything felt disconnected from everything else, but it was laggy, unresponsive at times, and once you had 1-2 apps open, it ran horrible.

I generally have 4-5 apps open on my nexus 7 and it's always smooth.

I've had no end of problems with my Nexus 7.. lots of random reboots, crashes, sometimes it'll just sit there rebooting for hrs.. and that's with it relatively clean, as I nuked it not that long ago.

That is certainly not normal, i've never seen any crashes or random reboots on my nexus 7. Sounds like its defective of its 'rebooting for hours'...

[Joshie]

if you have an adroid device, you should be on XDA :)

XDA regulars would have a heart attack if they saw your suggestion. The last thing they want is for it to be filled to the brim with what they'd perceive to be needy people who post without searching first, don't follow forum rules, and generally act entitled to tech support from a bunch of hobbyists.

In other words, your typical open sourceinternet community.

[CronicHazel]

It's not as bad as what it might appear from the OP's text, but my Arc definitely performed poorly cause of outdated specs

[Xerxes]

My Galaxy Nexus does this (running ICS 4.0.4), runs smooth and over time becomes incredibly laggy to the point it's nearly unusable. Even Jelly Bean (4.1, custom ROM) over time lags like crazy on my Acer A500 (not sure if the ROM is at fault or faulty hardware on the tablet). So Android is still an extremely laggy experience for me (what doesn't help is that fact iOS runs silky smooth on my gen5 iPod touch, never lags....so going back to my laggy Android is hard sometimes :laugh:). I really hope 4.1 fixes the lag issues on my Galaxy Nexus, that is if it ever gets released (my Galaxy Nexus is carrier locked and they are sitting on the update, claim they found a serious bug in it) and yes I know I could root it, but to make it work properly on my carrier would involve alot of fiddling which I can't be bothered doing :p

[REM2000]

My first android phone the galaxy note 2 coming from iphones. Never experienced the problem. The phone runs quickly and I haven't had to restart it yet. Everything is stock

[Nashy]

Absolutely it does. And before the pathetic fanboys come out and flame me, I've owned more Android devices than anything else.

Galaxy Nexus did.

HTC One X did.

Galaxy S3 did. S3 was the friggin worst.

[tsupersonic]

My Galaxy Nexus does this (running ICS 4.0.4), runs smooth and over time becomes incredibly laggy to the point it's nearly unusable. Even Jelly Bean (4.1, custom ROM) over time lags like crazy on my Acer A500 (not sure if the ROM is at fault or faulty hardware on the tablet). So Android is still an extremely laggy experience for me (what doesn't help is that fact iOS runs silky smooth on my gen5 iPod touch, never lags....so going back to my laggy Android is hard sometimes :laugh:). I really hope 4.1 fixes the lag issues on my Galaxy Nexus, that is if it ever gets released (my Galaxy Nexus is carrier locked and they are sitting on the update, claim they found a serious bug in it) and yes I know I could root it, but to make it work properly on my carrier would involve alot of fiddling which I can't be bothered doing :p

It's extremely easy to root an Android phone. I had my friend root her phone, and she drove through the whole process, while I watched. Hell there are even toolkits that pretty much do everything for you. There's a plethora of information/videos on the internet :p My Galaxy Nexus has been stable, and Jelly Bean made it so much smoother.

Absolutely it does. And before the pathetic fanboys come out and flame me, I've owned more Android devices than anything else.

Galaxy Nexus did.

HTC One X did.

Galaxy S3 did. S3 was the friggin worst.

Yeah, and my Windows Phone started to bog down after a while. The main UI was still smooth, but once you open up too much apps, it was game over. Not to mention the 'mulitasking' on WP just blows compared to Android/iOS

[Belazor]

So it seems today, the other shoe dropped, putting me firmly back into the realm of insecurity :p

It's not as bad as what it might appear from the OP's text, but my Arc definitely performed poorly cause of outdated specs

Yeah I accept that, since I don't remember what apps I was running, I may very well have installed something that had bugs in it causing this to occur. But the point remains, iOS has not degraded in a similar fashion despite similar usage patterns. Whatever the cause, I hope that if I do take the plunge and go with another Android device, it won't suffer similar issues.

[AJerman]

It almost entirely depends on how many and which apps you install. If you have 100 apps that all think they need a background process, then yes, you're going to see a slowdown. I generally run a handful (10-20) apps and some small games usually of the words with friends or scramble with friends variety, and I haven't had lag on the latest generation devices. I don't think I could make my One X lag if I tried. Older phones like my Captivate were definitely slower though, but again, the only relation to how long it had been since I'd factory reset would have been how many apps I had installed. Regardless, smooth then was nothing like smooth now. Project Butter really helps to smooth out the whole experience.

Put it this way, I've never found any of my Android devices to be any more or less laggy than iOS devices of the same time frame. The iOS fanboys just like to act like iOS never lags. I had a 3G a long time ago and it had horrible lag sometimes. I had an iPhone 4 and it was much better, but it too lagged now and then. I haven't had extensive experience with the iPhone 5, but I suspect, like Androids on current hardware, it would show very little to no lag. The reason it would have been more noticeable on an Android is because of the multitasking and allowing apps to freely run their own services. I think these features are major advantages of Android, but they aren't without some performance impact. That's why Apple is always able to include slower CPUs and less memory in the iPhone comparatively.

I'd really say that smart phones have only just matured in the last year or so. Prior to that, new features were being rolled out as fast as performance was being improved, especially on a mobile OS like Android that has more extensive multitasking and such. Now that mobile CPUs have gotten so fast and large amounts of memory are being included, lag isn't really much of a factor on more new phones from any manufacturer or type.

[Belazor]

It almost entirely depends on how many and which apps you install. If you have 100 apps that all think they need a background process, then yes, you're going to see a slowdown. I generally run a handful (10-20) apps and some small games usually of the words with friends or scramble with friends variety, and I haven't had lag on the latest generation devices. I don't think I could make my One X lag if I tried. Older phones like my Captivate were definitely slower though, but again, the only relation to how long it had been since I'd factory reset would have been how many apps I had installed. Regardless, smooth then was nothing like smooth now. Project Butter really helps to smooth out the whole experience.

Most useful, since indeed there's been quite literally a quadrupling of power (single core 1.5 GHz to quad core 1.5 GHz, 512 MB to 2GB of RAM) between my previous venture into Android and the phone I'm looking at :p

Put it this way, I've never found any of my Android devices to be any more or less laggy than iOS devices of the same time frame. The iOS fanboys just like to act like iOS never lags. I had a 3G a long time ago and it had horrible lag sometimes. I had an iPhone 4 and it was much better, but it too lagged now and then. I haven't had extensive experience with the iPhone 5, but I suspect, like Androids on current hardware, it would show very little to no lag. The reason it would have been more noticeable on an Android is because of the multitasking and allowing apps to freely run their own services. I think these features are major advantages of Android, but they aren't without some performance impact. That's why Apple is always able to include slower CPUs and less memory in the iPhone comparatively.

I know that the iPhone 4 (my current phone) lags like an asthmatic ant when I try to do fast browsing in Chrome Mobile, and I've figured out that mobile browsing with Chrome, Kindle and various social media clients are the primary usages of my smartphone. I don't mobile game - I always have something to read on the go, and so I need a phone that gives me the best mobile browsing experience with Chrome Mobile.

Why Chrome specifically? Because of the tab syncing, I need to be able to see my tabs from my phone on my desktop / tablet.

That's why I'm looking at a whale phone (5in) :p

I'd really say that smart phones have only just matured in the last year or so. Prior to that, new features were being rolled out as fast as performance was being improved, especially on a mobile OS like Android that has more extensive multitasking and such. Now that mobile CPUs have gotten so fast and large amounts of memory are being included, lag isn't really much of a factor on more new phones from any manufacturer or type.

Thanks, very helpful post :)

[beanboy89]

A friend at work mentioned something to me the other day that I had never heard before. Apparently the manual of his Droid 2 said that you are supposed to reboot the phone once a day, I assume to reduce lag. I've had both my phone and tablet bog down, but that was only when I was running a lot of heavy apps simultaneously. Once I close a few apps, the device becomes just as snappy as it would be on a fresh boot. Both my phone and tablet are rooted, running ICS and JB, respectively.

[Boz]

I'm still running Android 2.3 on my old HTC and have never had a problem but a friend of mine has the exact same phone and has had nothing but problems with bogging down. Not sure exactly what it is.

There are multiple reasons why this happens.

It comes down to:

1. Apps you install. If an app you installed has memory leaks (aka not coded right or has a bug that causes that memory leak) only that one app can cause your phone to become unstable as it will eat your memory. Unlike iOS, the thing with Android is that it is a true multitasking OS. This means that your apps runs as a process in the background and can execute things. iOS kills apps completely after you switch away from it, so the app can't do anything when it's in that state. It's a bit more complex than that but that's basically the gist of it.

2. The ROM version or custom ROMs might also have memory leaks themselves. Especially in launchers they put on top and that could be the cause of instability. At first everything runs great, but after time your OS gets out of memory and it starts closing processes and just becoming unstable. That's when you get those WAIT or CLOSE PROCESSES dialog.

For those who have issues my advice is when your Android device starts lagging, go to Applications and you will see processes there and how much memory they consume. You can spot which apps have memory leaks and just kill those and don't run them or if you do, make sure you close their process after you are done with it.

[Xerxes]

It's extremely easy to root an Android phone. I had my friend root her phone, and she drove through the whole process, while I watched. Hell there are even toolkits that pretty much do everything for you. There's a plethora of information/videos on the internet :p My Galaxy Nexus has been stable, and Jelly Bean made it so much smoother.

Yeah, and my Windows Phone started to bog down after a while. The main UI was still smooth, but once you open up too much apps, it was game over. Not to mention the 'mulitasking' on WP just blows compared to Android/iOS

Yeah, I know it's really easy to root the phone but that isn't the problem. Stock Android (on the Galaxy Nexus) doesn't work well with my carrier without tweaking it (need to replace the radio and change some other stuff) because my carrier insists on using the obscure. This in turn breaks the auto updating and means you cannot update to the newest version of Android, as Google pushes it out, without breaking the phone again....it's a nightmare from what I've read and I just can't be bothered with all the extra stuff you gotta do to make it work right again. Is my excuse anyway :p