Similar to a normal computer, Android allows you to run apps in the background even after you’ve moved on to your other tasks.
This optimizes your Android app performances and support for multitasking compared to iOS and Windows Phone who constantly close and reopen the apps them when you do so.
However, running too many apps in the background not only drains the battery faster but also slow down your device’s performance due to apps eating up your device’s RAM.
Maybe a particular app on your Android phone misbehave and may not work or your phone’s lagging, whatever the reason may be, closing a running app is quite simple.
Why it is not Recommended to Close Android apps?
Unless a particular app is misbehaving and needed a fresh restart, it is not required nor recommended for you to shut down apps because Android is very good at handling the apps appropriately and managing its resources.
If it has a decent amount of RAM to work with, it can actively shuffle the memory back and forth between the apps.
Related read: How to Set up & Enable Guest Mode on Android
Unfortunately, if your RAM is a bit short, your OS will close the app which you haven’t used for a while and assign that particular app’s RAM to the new task all in the background quietly.
As a matter of fact, closing the apps can have a worse effect than leaving them open.
Check what’s Draining your RAM and Battery
Before closing all the apps, if battery life is your major concern. You can check which app among them is draining the most battery life.
Find out the culprit and stop the app. Here are the steps to do so.
- Head to your Device Settings < Battery < Battery Usage.
- On the Battery Usage, you’ll get a list of the apps that are currently draining the most battery life on percentage basis.
Look out for the apps that have high usage and if you don’t use them often or not that important to you, you can close them.
The same goes for your device storage, find out which apps are talking the most RAM and especially if your are working with a RAM of around 2GB or less.
Your device can suffer from low memory storage, if the app you’re not particularly using is taking up a few hundred MB of your total storage.
To do so, you first need to enable Developer options.
- Head to your Phone Settings < System < About phone.
- Scroll down and find the “Build number” and then tap it for seven times to enable “Developer options.”
- Go to your Settings > System < Developer option < Processes < Running services.
- Find the apps with the most used RAM.
- Stop the app or uninstall from the device.
How to Force Stop App on an Android Phone
Once you’ve identified the mischievous app, do the following steps:
- Open your device Settings.
- Scroll down to Apps < Manage Apps or Select “Running” from your Manage Applications window.
- Choose the app that’s causing the nuisance.
- Tap “Force Stop” to close the app.
- Click on Uninstall to remove the app from your device.
Final Words:
Forcing to stop an app use up a portion of your battery and resources for closing it and clearing it from the RAM. Unless a particular app is misbehaving, it is not recommended to quit the background running apps as you are not necessarily saving your battery by frequently closing them.
In fact, resources will again be needed and used when you open the app again leading to a more increased usage of battery. Whatever the case may be, you can use the above steps to kill applications running in the background.
