Though the best Android phones come with plenty of storage these days, space is usually scarce on older devices and cheap phones, with a large part of the phone’s storage taken up by the operating system and preloaded apps.
The amount of phones with microSD card slots dwindle year by year, and you mostly find them on budget devices nowadays. If your phone does have the requisite hardware, using a memory card will not only allow you to store your photos and videos to it, but may also let you move some of your apps across.
Here’s our guide on how to move Android apps to an SD Card
What to know about adding storage
First, not all Android devices allow you to install portions of an installed app to the microSD card, but for those that do, it’s just a quick trip to the application manager and a button press away. Most flagship phones have moved away from support for this feature; it is more commonly found in midrange to low-end hardware, but these are often devices that could use the extra storage.
Unfortunately, even if your smartphone supports the feature, not all apps do. Large apps such as games leave most of their data on the internal storage. For example, Asphalt 8 puts just 64MB of data on the microSD card while leaving the remaining 1.4GB to fill up your phone or tablet. That said, you can save some space this way, particularly if you have a lot of apps installed and move as many as possible to a microSD card.
How to move apps to an SD card using an application manager
1. Navigate to Settings on your phone. You can find the settings menu in the app drawer.
2. Tap Apps.
3. Select an app you want to move to the microSD card.
4. Tap Storage.
5. Tap Change if it’s there.
If you don’t see the Change option, the app cannot be moved. If you are unable to find any apps with this option, it is likely that your device does not support the feature.
6. Tap Move.
If you wish to move an app back to the internal memory, hit the Change button again and select Internal Storage.
How to use an SD card as internal storage
If your device does not support moving apps to a microSD card there’s another option, first introduced in Android Marshmallow, that may be the answer for you. This feature is called Adoptable or Flex Storage, and it allows you to format a microSD card to act like added internal storage. Again, not all devices with a microSD slot will support this feature: Motorola, Huawei and Nvidia have all chosen to enable Flex Storage, while Samsung and LG have removed it.
There are a few factors to consider before enabling this feature. You will want the fastest microSD card that you can find to ensure smooth performance, at least Class 10 or UHS-I and preferably UHS-3. Any data present on the microSD card will be erased when you format it as internal storage, and from that point, it will be unusable in other devices (unless you reformat it again). Finally, remember that if you remove this microSD card from your phone, you will break functionality to any apps or content you’ve moved to it.
1. Navigate to settings on your phone. You can find the settings menu in the app drawer.
2. Tap Storage.
3. Select your SD card.
4. Tap the overflow menu button in the upper-right corner.
5. Select Storage Settings.
6. Tap Format as Internal.
7. Tap Erase & Format. If the system determines that your microSD card is too slow it will prompt you with a warning here that it will degrade performance.
8. Tap Move now. After making the selection you will tap next and initiate the transfer to your microSD card. The system will indicate roughly how long the transfer will take and how much data will be moved to your SD card.
9. Tap Done.
Your SD card will now be listed immediately below the internal shared storage and the system will use it as additional internal storage in the future.
More Android tips
Now you know how to move Android apps to an SD Card, take a look at how to speed up your Android phone or tablet in this quick and easy guide. For something more advanced, check out how to connect USB storage devices to your Android phone or how to print from an Android phone or tablet.
— Update: 10-02-2023 — us.suanoncolosence.com found an additional article How to Install and Move Android Apps to the SD Card from the website www.howtogeek.com for the keyword how to download apps to sd card.
Some Android phones don’t have a lot of storage, so you might run out of room for apps. If your device has an SD card slot, you can use that to expand the storage and have more room for apps. However, SD card support is more limited than it used to be.
What You Need to Know
Android apps are installed to your device’s internal storage by default. If you have a microSD card, you can move some of your currently installed apps over to the microSD card. This is not supported by all apps, however. In fact, many don’t support this feature at all.
The state of SD card support on Android is a shell of what it used to be. Not only is it much harder to find Android devices with SD card slots, but the functionality has been greatly diminished as well. We’ll show you what you might be able to do if you have a microSD card in your Android device.
RELATED: How to Free Up Storage Space on Your Android Phone
How to Move an Android App to an SD Card
First, swipe down from the top of the screen (once or twice, depending on your device) and tap the gear icon to open the Settings menu.
Next, select “Apps.”
You may need to tap “See All [Number] Apps” for the full list of installed apps. Some devices show the full list right away.
Select the app that you would like to move to the SD card.
Next, on the App Info page, select “Storage” or “Storage & Cache.”
If the app supports moving to the SD card, you’ll see a “Change” button. Tap it.
A menu will pop up with the option to change the storage location to “SD card.”
Tap “Move” on the next screen to begin the exporting process.
You’ll see a progress bar during the process bar. When it’s done, you’ll be returned to the Settings app.
Can You Install Apps Directly to the SD Card?
Older versions of this article explained how to install apps directly to the SD card and move any app to it, whether it officially supported the feature or not. Unfortunately, as of 2022, that’s no longer a feasible option on modern versions of Android.
Some manufacturers—namely, Samsung and LG—previously allowed users to format microSD cards as internal storage. That meant apps and games would be installed there by default. Sadly, this feature is no longer present on newer devices.
Technically, it’s still possible if you’re willing to go through the trouble of rooting your Android phone. In the past, this article recommended using apps that required root access, such as MiniTool Partition Wizard and Link2SD.
- How To Install Android Apps On Kindle Fire
- The Best Free Album Download Sites to Get Free Music
- 12 Free Online Games Like Wordle to Try if You’ve Solved Today’s Word
- The best YouTube to MP3 Converter & Downloader
- How to Get Fonts from Dafont to Cricut & Use the Secret Characters Called Glyphs!
Read more:
Rooting an Android phone is not as worth it as it used to be. Android has gotten much better and the rooting process has only gotten more difficult. It’s simply not a legitimate solution for the majority of people.
Sadly, not many Android phones have SD card slots anymore, and it seems that even fewer apps support the ability to be moved to external storage. If you do have an SD card slot, you should take advantage of it.
— Update: 10-02-2023 — us.suanoncolosence.com found an additional article How To Install Apps Directly To Your SD Card from the website www.carlcare.com for the keyword how to download apps to sd card.
A large chunk of your phone’s storage has to take the operating system and preloaded software, so by the time you start downloading videos and installing apps, you might run out of storage. On how to install apps directly to your SD card, you can try out these different solutions or even go-ahead to expand your phone memory to create space.
Part 1. Set SD card as internal storage
If your device does not support moving apps to a microSD card after installing, then is a feature that allows you to format a microSD card to act like added internal storage. Not all devices with a microSD slot support this feature, and some brands like Samsung and LG have removed it from newer models of their phones. It is also known as rooting.
For best results on this;
- Make use of the fastest SD card you can lay hands on. You can check Carlcare service centres for top quality and warranty-covered SD cards that will give you optimum performance.
- Also note that any information already present on the SD card will be formatted or erased, and you cannot use the SD card on another device unless you reformat it.
- Once you remove this SD card from your phone, your app functionalities will be affected.
Here is how to do it.
- Launch Settings > Navigate to Storage and tap on it > you will see the RAM, internal storage, and memory card > Select your SD card by tapping the three vertical dots (menu button) by the right corner of the memory card > Select Format as internal
- For some devices, you may have to select Storage settings before you will find the option to Format as internal.
- After selecting Format as Internal > Tap Erase & Format
- If the system sees that your microSD card is too slow, it will prompt you with a warning that it will degrade performance. You can choose to proceed or stop and retry with another SD card.
- Tap on Move Now (to initiate moving your files and apps to SD card) > Tap Done when it is finished
Your SD card will now be listed below the internal shared storage and the system will use it as additional internal storage in the future when you want to install apps.
Note: You can alspo learn how to move files from internal storage to SD card on your phone.
Part 2. Using the Application Manager to Move Apps from internal memory to SD
If you cannot install apps directly to your SD card, you could go ahead and install the application on your internal memory, and then move to SD card. However, this is not found on all devices and not also applicable to all apps. You can try this if you do not want to bother about how to install android apps on SD card without rooting.
Here are the steps to transfer apps to SD card on android.
- Navigate to Settings on your phone > Navigate and select Apps > Select an App you want to move to the SD card.
- Tap Storage > Tap Change > Tap Move
If you don’t see the option to Change Storage, then the app cannot be moved. This is the developers’ choice and it means that such an app is meant to deliver some features that cannot run from the SD card. Try another app, but if none of the apps gives you this option, then your device does not support the feature.
Part 3. Change the default storage to SD card
Let’s look at how to install apps directly to SD cards from the google play store, by changing the settings and setting the SD as default memory. Keep in mind that this solution is not applicable to all android devices. It works on those operating with the Android 4.4.2 Operating system. They usually have limited internal storage, so larger apps have to be installed on the SD card.
- Ensure that a compatible SD card has been inserted into the device
- From the Home screen, Tap Settings > Navigate and Tap Storage > Check to turn on the SD card, and set the SD card as the default storage place.
- From the Home screen, Tap File Browser open > Navigate and select Apps > Choose a particular app to be installed > Tap OK to install the App to SD card
Part 4. Using a third-party app manager
A third-party app manager is an app that manages other apps. You can easily get one of these from the play store
- Launch the Google Play Store
- Type App manager in the Search bar. This will give you a list of third-party app managers from which you can choose from. Some third-party app managers are free while others are premium, do some research and decide. A couple of apps that have received quality reviews are the File Manager 4.7-star rating and the App Manager with 4.3-star rating.
- Install your preferred option.
- Whatever app you choose, you will have to grant permissions the first time you launch it.
- They are pretty simple to use and navigate and you can then use it to move apps from one location to the other.
Part 5. Use Android Studio and Android SDK to configure your phone to automatically install apps onto your SD card
If you want to use the Android SDK to install apps directly to your SD card, you will start by installing the SDK app. This is a small program that allows your PC to communicate with the Android operating system. That means you need a PC to execute this solution. This is also a very technical process so you have to follow it carefully.
- You can download the app on your phone by searching Android SDK on playstore and picking a preferred option.
- Also download and install the Google Android SDK onto your computer.
- Once you have downloaded and installed it, Plug your phone into your PC using the USB charging cable
- From the options, select File Transfer
- On your phone, Launch Settings > Select Developer Options > Scroll down and Tap USB Debugging
- On your PC, open the Platform-tools folder and open a CMD window within the folder. (If you’re on Windows it might be under a folder like this: C:UsersUser1AppDataLocalAndroidSdkplatform-tools)
- Type ‘adb devices’ to view all connected devices > Type ‘adb shell pm set-install-location 2’ to set the install location to external, SD card in this case.
- Type ‘adb shell pm get-install-location’ to view the location where apps are installed
- If you see 2 [external] in the CMD window, you’re all set. If you don’t, try again.
You will subsequently install Apps directly to your SD card, with the exception of those apps that the developers have set to only install to phone.
After reading all solutions, you must have identified one or two that work best for your Android phone. The rooting option is there and you can also install apps directly to your SD card without rooting. Go ahead and try it out.
Need Further Help? Contact Carlcare
Whatever the issue is that you cannot handle, book a Carlcare service reservation, and we got you covered. Carlcare is the official after-sales service center for all Infinix, Tecno, Itel, Oraimo and Syinix brands.
Carlcare provides support services in the form of professional repair and maintenance service ensuring that your phone is kept in optimal shape while you enjoy using it. You won’t find a better phone support service out there.
— Update: 10-02-2023 — us.suanoncolosence.com found an additional article How to Install Apps on SD Card on Android from the website www.imobie.com for the keyword how to download apps to sd card.
Insufficient Storage notifications always pop out on Android phones. The most likely reason for this problem is that phone memory is set as the default storage. If you download and install various applications, the phone’s memory would be full, affecting its productivity. By using SD Cards, you can expand your device storage memory with respect to your needs. How to install apps on SD card then?
Not only this, there are many other queries raised by Android users like how to transfer apps to SD Card Android. Well, this article will provide you with satisfying methods and results to resolve all these issues.
How to Install Apps on SD Card Android?
If your phone memory is too full to get an app installed, or you’re meeting an Android app not installed error, you can choose to download an app on SD card. To download apps on an SD card, you need to set up an SD card as the internal storage first. Follow the steps below to set up an SD card as the internal storage and at the same time, move Android apps to your SD card. Afterward, you will learn how to install apps on an SD card on Android, directly and easily.
Set Up an SD Card as Internal Storage.
Step 2. Once you’ve seen the pop-up window as “Set up your SD card”, click on “Use as Internal Storage”. A message will display on the screen asking you to set up the SD card for internal storage. Create a backup of your SD card and click “Erase and Format”.
Set up Your SD Card
Step 3. Wait for some time till the device is formatting the data on it. After that, you will be asked to move the data to the SD card. To move the data select “Move Now”. Select “Move Later” if you want to manage the data migration some other time.
Format an Internal Storage
SD Card Is Ready
Download and Install Apps on SD Card?
Once you have set up your SD card as the internal storage and move old apps to your new SD card, you can install new apps on the SD card with a few clicks. Normally, you can directly search your favorite app in the “App store”. However, considering different brand of Android phones has different “app store”, you may fail to find the app you need. Nevertheless, with the help of AppTrans, you can also directly install an app on SD card, as long as you have the .apk file on your computer. Freely download AppTrans and keep reading to figure out how to make it with a few clicks.
Tap App Install and Install Now
Step 2. Connect your Android phone to the computer and select the app you’d like to install from the computer.
Select the App to Install
Step 3. Navigate to the app file on your computer and open it.
Navigate and Open the App
Step 4. When AppTrans starts to install the app, you’ll see the following interface.
Wait for Installing the App
Step 5. Once you have seen the App installation completed interface on your computer, your Android phone will receive a message, asking you to allow AppTrans to install apps on your Android phone.
App Installation Permission
Bonus Tip. How to Transfer Apps From Android To Android
After making a purchase of a new Android phone, transferring important data like contacts or photos from your old Android phone to the new device is necessary as it would be rather inconvenient to start with a brand new phone. When it comes to apps, traditionally, you might have to only download them one by one.
We all know that downloading and installing apps is quite time-consuming. Things could be worse if you have lots of apps waiting to be downloaded. Under this circumstance, we strongly suggest you try AnyDroid.
AnyDroid, developed by iMobie inc., aims at providing all Android users a more convenient way to manage data on their phones. One of the most famous features of it is transferring apps from Android to Android. For this function, AnyDroid has the following outstanding performance:
- Transfer apps from Android to Android directly, with which you don’t have to go through the complicated transferring process.
- Transfer data at a blazing fast speed. According to statistics, it can transfer 1.7 GB of data from Android to Android within 1 minute.
- Keep data safe and secure. It is developed by a trustworthy developer and you have our guarantee that while using this software, no information leakage or data loss would occur.
Select Apps to Transfer from Android to Android
Why not download AnyDroid now? Follow the guide to transfer apps from Android to Android.
The Bottom Line
That’s all for how to install apps on an SD card on Android. If you still have any questions, please do leave comments below. AppTrans is indeed a nice tool to install apps in SD card. Besides, it can also help you to transfer apps between different brands of mobile phones. Why not download it now to your computer to take a try?
— Update: 10-02-2023 — us.suanoncolosence.com found an additional article How to Move Apps to SD card? Here’s the 3 Best Easy Ways from the website www.airdroid.com for the keyword how to download apps to sd card.
Android apps are installed on your phone’s storage by default. There come times when you need to transfer apps from your phone’s internal storage to an SD card due to storage capacity issues. But not many people know how to transfer applications between the phone’s internal storage and SD card.
If you’re one of them, then look no further. This article aims to provide several simple solutions about how to move apps to SD cards without any hassles.
Without any further ado, let’s cut to the chase!
Part 1: How to Move Apps to SD Card on Android 8 Oreo and Below through Settings
One of the simplest methods to move the app to an SD card is through your phone’s Settings. The procedure is as simple as it can get. But note that the steps might differ a bit on different Android versions. In any case, check out the below instructions to make the transfer:
Step 1. From your phone’s home screen, go to the Settings app.
Step 2. Then, scroll down to App and tap it. Then, tap See All Apps.
- How to Install iOS 16 Beta 5 on iPhone? A Complete Guide
- The Sims 3 Download Free Full PC
- Can You Download Netflix Movies on Mac?
- Download Netflix Movies without Netflix App
- How to download songs on Spotify
Read also:
Step 3. Now, open the app you want to move to the SD card. And tap “Storage” or “Storage & Cache”.
Step 4. The system will show if the app is stored on your phone’s internal storage or your SD card. Tap the “Change” button and choose the SD card option to move it to the SD card.
Step 5. Finally, tap Move to begin the exporting process.
Remember that the procedure might be a little different for different Android versions like Huawei, Samsung, OnePlus, etc. But the basic methodology is same.
Part 2: How to Move Android Apps to SD Card on Android Pie 9 or above
If your Android phone is running on Android Pie or above, then you can’t just move every app to the SD card. But you can still transfer applications even if your phone doesn’t support adoptable storage. Check out the below steps to Move Android Apps to an SD card:
Step 2. From the available list, tap the app you want to move to the SD card.
Step 3. Now, find and tap Storage and you’ll see a button named Change. Tap this option.
Step 4. Finally, tick the SD Card option on the Change storage dialog box. A confirmation tab will pop up. Hit Move to begin the process.
Part 3: Easiest Way to Move Apps to SD Card Android – Use a Third-Party App
It’s worth mentioning that not all Android phones allow you to move the apps from the internal storage to an SD card. Plus, it might take you forever to complete the moving process if you have plenty of apps installed on your phone.
That’s where a professional Android data management program like AirDroid Personal comes into play. This tool is developed specifically to allow users to move any type of data including Google Play Store apps between SD card and internal storage. The best thing is you can move all the applications in one go, instead of repeating the same procedure for every single app.
What makes it so useful is its super-fast speed and sleek interface. Even a non-technical user can move apps without any prior knowledge. Aside from that, AirDroid Personal gives you the freedom to transfer files between two Android phones as well as across devices including Windows, Mac, Android, and iPhone.
Here’s how to move an app to SD card using AirDroid Personal:
Step 1. First of all, install AirDroid Personal mobile app on your Android phone. Run the program and login/signup with your AirDroid account.
Also, download its desktop version from the official website and login with the same account.
Step 2. Launch the desktop client and select your Android device under the My Devices tab.
Step 3. Now, click on the Files icon in the left menu. The program will show all the data on your Android phone including the apps.
Step 4. Now, expand the System option, copy all the apps, and simply paste them in SD card.
Final Remarks
And that’s it. This article contains all the information you need about how to move apps to SD card Android. No matter how many apps you want to transfer, this powerful program offers the quickest procedure to get the job done.
The functionality of AirDroid Personal goes beyond Android file management. It is a one-stop solution to perform tons of functions like Android SMS management, using Android as remote camera, file transfer, and many more.
Use it once and it will come up to your expectations. Download its free version from here.
— Update: 10-02-2023 — us.suanoncolosence.com found an additional article How to move apps to an SD card from an Android to free up storage space on your phone from the website www.businessinsider.com for the keyword how to download apps to sd card.
- You can move apps to an SD card from the Apps section of an Android phone’s Settings with just a few taps.
- If your Android phone has an SD card slot, you can move apps out of internal storage.
- Storing apps on an SD card can free up space on your phone for other apps and data.
Most Android phones have an SD card slot — or, more likely, a microSD card slot— which allows you to significantly expand the storage space in your phone. Most of the time you’ll probably get a lot of value out of this expansion slot by storing data files like music and documents.
But you can also free up your phone’s internal storage space by moving apps to the SD card as well. It’s simple to do and takes just a few taps.
How to move apps to an SD card from an Android
1. Open the Settings app and tap “Apps.”
2. Tap an app that you want to move to the storage card.
3. On the app’s details page, you should see a section called “Storage,” which summarizes how much space the app is taking up on your phone’s internal storage — tap “Storage.”
4. You should see that the storage being used is Internal Storage. Tap “Change” and then, in the pop-up window, choose the storage card.
5. On the next page, tap “Move.”
6. When it’s done, the app will now be located on the SD card.
Keep in mind that while you can move many apps to the phone’s storage card, this won’t work for everything. The app’s developer gets to decide whether the app can run from an SD card, and so for some apps this won’t be an option. In particular, you can’t move many built-in Android apps and bundled apps that come with your phone.
Make sure you have an SD card installed
If you’re not sure if you have an SD (or microSD) card installed in your phone, there are two ways to check: You can physically eject the card tray to see if it’s occupied, or look in Settings. Using Settings is more informative because it will also show you how much free space is available on the card.
To find out, start the Settings app and then use the search icon at the top to look for “Storage.” Tap “Storage” when you see it in the search results. If you have a storage card installed, you’ll see it displayed on the screen, along with its capacity and how much is in use.
Related coverage from Tech Reference:
-
What is a microSD card? Here’s what you need to know about the miniature storage device
-
How to clear an SD card and erase all of its data, including the hidden junk files you can’t usually delete
-
What is an SD card? Here’s what you need to know about the small memory cards for electronic devices
-
SSD vs. HDD: How to decide which storage option is the best for your computer
-
What is an SSD? Everything you should know about solid state drives
-
How to insert an SD card into a Nintendo Switch to save game data and screenshots, or remove a card that’s already in
— Update: 10-02-2023 — us.suanoncolosence.com found an additional article How to Download Android Apps to an SD card from the website www.alphr.com for the keyword how to download apps to sd card.
Many newer Android phones come with an SD card slot that expands the built-in memory substantially. If the internal storage isn’t enough for your needs, this accessory is an essential aspect of your phone. Even if a smartphone comes with 16GB of internal storage, it is too easy to fill it up with media, apps and files. That’s why I put this guide on how to download Android apps to an SD card together.
Anyone who uses their smartphone to manage their life will know that no matter how much storage you have, you always need more. If you can download apps to your SD card, you circumvent that. You no longer need to perform housekeeping and delete files and apps before downloading something new. You can just download to your card instead. Here’s how.
You will need your Android smartphone, a USB charging cable to connect it and a computer. You may also need a third party app manager or the Android SDK installed onto your computer depending on how you want to proceed.
Ways to Move Android Apps to an SD card
If you already have Android apps on your smartphone that you want to move to free up space, you can do that. You can either do it using the phone itself or a third party app manager. There are many apps that manage other apps. Some are free while others are premium. I won’t name names here as they change all the time. Do some research and decide which app manager you like the look of and has been well reviewed.
Using the Phone to Move Apps
- Navigate to the Settings menu on your phone.
- Open the app you want to move.
- Tap the Move to SD Card button if there is one. Not all phones or apps will allow this through the UI so if you don’t see the option, don’t worry.
Using a third-party app manager
- Navigate to Google Play Store and select Apps.
- Find an app manager you like the look of and install it.
- Using the Google Play Store app to manage app installations and save locations is necessary unless you root your phone.
The aptly named App Manager and File Manager are two popular choices that have received quality reviews.
Some third party app managers are free while others are premium, do some research and decide which app manager you like the look of. Different app managers work in slightly different ways but many will list apps as movable or not and give the option to either leave them on your smartphone’s internal storage or move them onto your SD card. Work through your apps and move them around as you see fit.
Using Android Studio and SDK to Install Apps Onto an SD Card
If you want to install apps directly onto your SD card by default, you can do that too. You will need to install the Android SDK, which is a small program that allows your PC to communicate with the Android operating system. It is safe to download and install from the link provided below.
If you have, or don’t mind using, the Android SDK, you can configure your phone to automatically install apps onto your SD card. Here’s how.
- Plug your phone into your PC using the USB charging cable and set it for file transfer.
- Download and install the Google Android SDK onto your computer.
- On your phone, navigate to Settings>Developer Options.
- Next, scroll down and select USB Debugging, depending on your phone and version of Android, the menu may differ but it’s in there somewhere.
- On the PC, open the Platform-tools folder and open a CMD window within the folder. (shift+right click open command window here). If you’re on Windows it might be under a folder like this: C:UsersUser1AppDataLocalAndroidSdkplatform-tools. You can also navigate to the folder via the command prompt.
- Type ‘adb devices’ to view all connected devices.
- Type ‘adb shell pm set-install-location 2’ to set the install location to external, SD card in this case.
- Type ‘adb shell pm get-install-location’ to view the location where apps are installed.
- If you see 2 [external] in the CMD window, you’re all set. If you don’t, try again.
This PC process sets your SD card as the default install location for apps going forward. You should now be able to install most apps directly onto the SD card. However, not every app will work correctly using this method. Unfortunately, it is a matter of trial and error to see which do and which do not. If an app errors, manually install it onto internal storage for it to work correctly again.
How do you manage your internal and external memory? Have any neat management tricks you want to share? Tell us below if you do!
Source: https://www.tomsguide.com/us/move-android-apps-to-sd-card,news-21279.html