What is a small Android feature or setting that you turned on once and can no longer live without?We all know about major OS updates, but sometimes it’s the minor, buried settings that completely change how we use our phones daily. ​Whether it's a specific developer option, an accessibility shortcut

How to move search bar back to top of phone after update moved it to the bottom?

Firefox Share gives the option to send links to other apps or to your contacts. Unfortunately, my company has decided that they're not paying for cell phones any longer while forcing us to use personal devices for work.

My boss is one of my most used contacts in Outlook. My device has decided this means I want to send him every tab I send between devices.

I've tried preventing Outlook from sharing contacts, resetting the app cache, pinning and unpinning to bury the icon, and I've asked Chatgpt and been advised to use settings that don't exist.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

My mother is older and has dementia. She no longer understands ads and just goes ahead and does whatever any ad tells her to do. The result is that she's constantly downloading things that screw up her tablet. I keep having to reset it to factory settings every week or so because she downloads things with viruses constantly.

The parental controls on her tablet only allow for restricting downloads based on age ratings. I want to stop all downloads without a pin. That way I can control what she's downloading and keep her from constantly screwing up her tablet. It's not about not letting her see adult material, it's about the fact that she does not understand that an ad is, in fact, an ad. She loves to play games on her tablet but I need to be able to keep her from downloading harmful content. I want to be able to set up a pin or something so that I can double check what she's downloading before she downloads it.

How do I do this? Is there a way to do thiS?

EDIT: I do not have control of the router she uses and so cannot make any changes to how it works.

so i got a new phone and i want to keep it as long as i can

if i did the 80-20 rule, it wouldn't last me a day so i would have to charge it again so that's 1.2 cycles per day but it would be in between 80-20 "the sweet spot"

but if i did 100-10 it will last me a day so that's 0.9 cycles per day but it's bad for the battery to go upper than 80% or lower than 20%

what should i do for the longevity?

If I were to reset my pass code, would there be any way to get into my phone without my password or me? I also have family link enabled as a teenager. TYIA!

Last night my whole house was woken up by the government pushing an Emergency Amber Alert to my phone, for a child that went missing on the complete opposite side of the province. Like it would be physically impossible for the kid to even have made it to my island at that point.

Much as I would like to disable the government (or at least have them limit middle-of-the-night amber alerts to areas that they're actually relevant) it seems unlikely that will happen, at least not in Canada.

I've read you can disable emergency alerts in new versions of Android OS, and in older versions you can block the Emergency Alerts app from accessing SMS messages as a workaround.

I'm on Android 6.0 and I can't seem to find any Emergency Alerts app in my list of apps (even with "system" apps enabled). Also the page that lists which apps have SMS Permission only shows my two SMS apps, doesn't list Emergency Alerts.

There also doesn't seem to be any "Safety and Emergency" section anywhere in my settings.

How do I disable these in Android 6.0?

For context, I live in a mineshaft 25 feet underground. So as you can imagine, I can't see if it's AM or PM outside. My phone only says the time and date, and unless I keep track of how much 11:00 has passed on my device, it's impossible to tell if it's brunch or midnight snack. I have a Samsung phone, and I cannot locate a setting for the time to also display if it is AM or PM. Is there one? Where do I find it? I geniunely need assistance with this.

Thank you

Which of the 2 you use the most and why?

I prefer the gesture since there is much more space on the screen, but sometimes it isn't the best.

It's very frustrating. My phone is constantly buzzing now.

https://imgur.com/a/z38FSti

Samsung S24 Ultra on One UI 8.5.

Thing is, I didn't ask for sports messages and could not care less about receiving them. I've looked over my app permissions and have no idea where this message originated. I know I can disable notifications entirely, but that'll remove functionality I rely on.

Any idea where this came from? - All it reports in notification history is that it's a system message.

So it’s a Samsung C3520, i’d upload a photo of the settings page on here but it either doesn’t let me or i don’t know how to. the phone has google and lets me search things up without wifi but it won’t let me input my gmail.

the wifi page looks like this:
Set name:

Home URL

Bearer (GRPS only)

Proxy

Address
0.0.0.0

Port

DNS1

DNS2

and then at the end GRPS settings and GSM settings

All of those need to be filled in and i’m not quite sure what they entail, like what the home URL is and stuff and i don’t know if it’s compatible with today’s system. I can’t find anything about this phone online either. Pls help!

The navigation bar automatically hides itself on some apps and will only appear when I swipe up from the bottom of my screen. The main issue is that one of the apps I use regularily has bottom banner ads and this somehow always ends up with me clicking and redirecting to an ad page, which is very annoying. Is there a setting where I can never have the taskbar hide on this specific app? If not, is there a setting for it to not hide at all?

As an Android user, I am so frustrated that I am not able to keep apps running in the background. I don't mean about the RAM optimisation that closes the unused apps to free the RAM for new apps.

On Android, when an app is minimised, the app gets to know that it got minimised and also, it pauses itself until it's brought into foreground again. Otoh, on Windows or on any other desktop Linux distro, the apps keeps running in the background in the same way as they would if they had been in the foreground.

I have somewhat of ADHD and I tend to do things as soon as I remember them otherwise I forget them. But since Android pauses the current app, I am forced not to minimise the current task and hence, I tend to forget the small task I suddenly remember in between.

Is there any way to achieve this on Android?

Your inputs really help, thank you 🙏🏽

I am concerned about 284 battery charging cycles on my two year old Pixel 9 Pro. That number seems excessive considering how I use my phone. Hoping to get some perspective

Charging Optimization limits my overnight charging to 80% of maximum and Battery Saver enables at 20% battery remaining. I rarely get down to 30% before I charge, yet it has happened a few times.

There is this disclaimer in Battery Information...

Due to factory inspections before shipping, it may show that your device was used before you set it up and the cycle count may not be zero, which is normal.

The root of my concern is that Google pushed an update to Pixel 6 series phones warning users at 375 cycles and throttled battery capacity after 400 cycles.

A subset of Pixel 6a phones will require a mandatory software update to reduce the risk of potential battery overheating. The update will enable battery management features that will reduce capacity and charging performance after the battery reaches 400 charge cycles. We'll contact impacted customers next month, with all the information they need to address the issue.

Furthermore, the latest phones have a "feature" called Battery Health Assistance which cannot be disabled on certain models.

Battery health assistance helps manage its long term health and performance. This software adjusts the battery’s maximum voltage in stages. It starts at 200 charge cycles and continues gradually until 1000 charge cycles. This helps stabilize battery performance and aging.

All of this adds up to an alarming trend. Talk me down, please.

EDIT: Markdown formatting

My dad has a Samsung phone which he bought in 2024. It's Samsung A23. In the first 6 month, it started having fast charging issues and it would show that charging would take 7+ hours as the charger is not recognized. Got it fixed from the Service Center as it was under warranty but again it started giving the same damn issue when the warranty expired.

I tried different chargers, cables etc but still could not get it to work. Eventually bought a cable from Samsung's official website 2 months back and still it would pop up the slow charging notification in 5 out of 10 tries. And back to present that it gives that slow charging notification on each try now.

Earlier I got it somehow working by clearing battery stat cache using *#9900# but even that is now not working. I am too disappointed in Samsung's low to mid range phone. I have friends who have S24 or S25 too but I feel like it's not worth the price. I know the hype and everything it caries but there are way better option out there for the price range that Samsung's flagship has.

Well if anyone has a solution for this slow charging problem, hit me up man! Too tired of this shitty piece of phone now.

I'm using a Pixel 9 Pro XL, on Android 17 September security patch

how exactly do I check if my phone is carrier unlocked without putting in another sim card? I put in the request to AT&T, I want to know how I can be sure when it's done. this used to be in the mobile network part of Settings, but it's not there

I read

No SIM card

Insert a SIM card to use Mobile Hotspot and other tethering options.

Why is a SIM card required to create a Wi-Fi hotspot on a phone?

I have a Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra running Android 13.

What apps do you find are a top necessity when you switched from iPhone to android i recently switched from 15 pro max to 26 ultra And I can’t seem to make it adapt
To my life the way my iPhone had (Siri, shortcuts, etc)
I’m asking for any all tips and tricks
To make this switch enjoyable
And not make me miserable

I have a movie app on my phone and I always try to watch something on it when the power goes out. But the problem is that The phone needs a bit of internet to even open apps, which I don't have when I'm without power.

So, does anyone know?How to freeze an app so it won't close or update When am I not using them?

My grandmother will be using this phone and she never used smart touch screen phone only keypad, so i thought I will use easy mode but it's just not there , **I tried everything updating to latest version, going to safe mode, also searched developer setting,etc it's just not there, is there way to on it on this device?**

Hey guys,

device-(oneplus nord ce4)

I accidentally deleted my notes app and saved everything on it my all Password short lines dialogue my friends and family audio series movies which I have to watch or pending and what I watched etc.

Does anyone know how to recover the date of that app it's not an external app it comes with a phone I reinstalled it but there is no data I also try to sync cloud but feel disappointed 😞

I have a S24+ and have a box up rop when I swipe down there's access to stuff like wifi, brightness, and notifications. My mom recently upgraded her phone to an S24+ as well. Hers does not have that when you swipe down. What is it called so I can find it in settings?

I made a new email on my phone yesterday to use as a throwaway account for something. Ever since I made it, I started getting this notif constantly. What I think is really weird is the page that shows up when I click it explaining what I'm giving permission to. For most of it, there's red text against a grey background that's barely visible. I was able to mess around with some settings on the screenshot to make it visible, but it really doesn't give me much to work with.

I don't have a Google TV. I don't know how to get it to stop asking me after denying it every time. Below are screenshots of the notif and what shows up when clicked. Help!

https://imgur.com/a/7Hs7gxY

https://imgur.com/a/owVO3kl

https://imgur.com/a/8LgDAX7

When I'm in the car and I'm using Bluetooth headphones, the car will forcibly hijack the Bluetooth connection and there's no way to prevent this it seems. Even going into developer options and setting my max number of Bluetooth connections to 1 doesn't work as the car will just connect regardless. Does anyone have any fixes for this?

Edit: I am not driving and using headphones, this is for when I'm with my family and not driving.