How Often Do You Need to Restart Your Smartphone?

Phone calls to tech support often start with the same advice: restart your smartphone or other device. Very often, a reboot will clear up slow performance and repair glitches.

Thus, many smartphone owners maintain the habit of restarting their phones periodically if the devices appear to need help or not. Still, mobile electronics have changed a lot in the past few years. New smartphones should not require restarting very often. In fact, frequent reboots may offer an early warning that the phone needs attention or service.

According to advice from Zagg Repair, a smartphone repair service, phone engineers have improved the design of smartphones considerably in the past couple of years. For instance, manufacturers have enhanced operating systems to handle memory usage better and conserve resources.

Periodic reboots may temporarily solve performance problems. Still, smartphone users should not need to restart their modern devices very often. In fact, if your device needs frequent reboots, there may be a bigger issue that requires attention. In other words, smartphone technicians no longer consider frequent restarts a cure, but rather a symptom.

With that in mind, Zagg still suggests restarting smartphones once or twice per week. At the same time, smartphone users should consider getting their device serviced if they need to restart their smartphone daily.

Android Central disagreed with the phone repair shop's advice by saying sometimes smartphones may still require daily restarts. Still, they pinpointed the likely problem as apps that did not properly release memory after shutting down. These memory issues may appear as seemingly unrelated problems, like slow performance or glitches in other apps. Removing the offending apps or restarting after using them would probably fix the problem.

Sometimes, the phone's storage may get overloaded, and the phone can't access enough resources to perform well. Thus, another solution could involve moving files or, if possible, adding more storage capacity. At this point, smartphone users might also consider upgrading to a phone with more memory.

Several years ago, there were apps that would stop other apps and clear memory. These apps have lost popularity since modern devices and apps have improved, though. Like restarting, these apps sometimes mask issues that the device owner could correct. Also, rebooting the smartphone might offer a faster and better solution than adding one more app to an already challenged device.

Smartphones come with short-term limited warranties, but they generally exclude problems that might stem from any apps the user downloads after purchase. Suppose simple debugging measures, like deleting apps or trimming files, don't solve the problem. In that case, people can't rely on a limited warranty to pay for diagnosing and fixing the need for frequent reboots.

A smartphone subscription warranty from Upsie offers a better way to keep phones performing and extend their usable lifespan. Highlights of Upsie smartphone protection include:

With an Upsie warranty, smartphone owners don't need to hesitate to obtain professional service when they need it. Upsie also offers protection plans for other types of electronics that require frequent reboots, like PCs and routers.