A few changes to your Android phone can help speed up the Internet connection, making the browsing bearable. Do not expect this to change your outdated phone into a speed monster just like that, but these small hacks will make internet browsing less painful for sure.
Opera Max
The browser is a blessing if you want to control the amount of data that is downloaded, and optimise your browsing speeds. The app was designed mindful of crowded Wi-Fi networks but it works well for increasing browsing speeds on 3G as well. It actively optimises streaming content to keep it lean and brisk. Recent updates have claimed that they have achieved an increase of as much as 23% over conventional usage, which is a very startling number – almost a quarter faster which about half the data consumed. If you are using a 3G network, Opera Max should be your first step to milk the connection and go from here if you don’t see a marked advantage.
Facebook Lite
Facebook’s usual app sucks battery and data almost phenomenally, and the best thing to do on a 3G network is to switch to Facebook Lite that was specifically designed to cut down on both these excesses. It is dedicated to providing the most faithful experience of the world’s most popular social networking website, while using up as less bandwidth as possible.
You may be using the browser for Facebook after getting rid of the Facebook app, but the experience of an app is always cleaner than the browser, and Facebook Lite is just for you. The app is easily available on the Play Store.
Disable images in your browser
For a smooth experience, try putting your browser to Text Only, the setting can be found in the Settings menu of most phones. This will prevent your phone from spending time loading images, the bulk of internet traffic is lost in them. The boost in speed will be obvious once you disable images on your browser, although the quality of content will take a hit.
Find a better web browse
While Chrome is perfect for us with its ability to sync across multiple devices which includes passwords and bookmarks, it is not the perfect browser if you are looking for something that is lean on memory use. Opera Max is the best recommended in this regard, and with its third party VPN, you can end up saving tons of data on music and photo sharing apps, social media apps and lots more, and you can even monitor them to see what apps are consuming most data, managing your data consumption to even increase speads on your Wi-Fi. You can also use the Opera Mini, which is a richer version, and both apps are available for free on the App store.
Clear your cache
If the things listed above do not seem to work, the trouble may rather be in your phone that your data connection. Because most apps are suited for use with a 4G connection, some unexpected resource management issues may crop up. However, you do not need to worry as they are easily resolvable once you have identified them. Not clearing your cache may lead to a bloated storage, which may be slowing your device down. This is a very common issue of old Android phones, and a stuffed cache may slow your phone as well as your internet browsing down. Dumping all that cache is easy, all you have to do is go to Setting > Applications and then tap on the app you suspect of having the cache data. You can tap on the Clear Cache option within the app, and repeat this process on other apps. A cleaning app will also let you do this, and may also have an option to clear the cache of all the applications with a single tap.
Uninstall memory hogging apps
Any widgets or apps that you may suspect of using up memory while they function in the background should be gotten rid of. While newer Androids are getting better and better at preventing background apps and widgets from hogging memory making the Android sluggish, it is always advisable to get rid of apps that are not in use.
Change your Preferred Network Mode
The phone’s preferred network mode may be the final straw in your problem if you have tried all of the above and none works. Where to find this setting depends on your phone, but you should try to look in the Settings under items that relate to network connectivity.
Once you go to network connection you will find that GSM is 2G and WCDMA is 3G. The default setting happens to be “GSM/WCDMA/LTE auto”, which will automatically change your phone between networks depending on the highest tier available at that time. Many areas where you know that 4G network is very poor then you need to change your network connection to GSM/WCDMA and make sure that your phone only looks for 2G/3G connections.
In your phone if you have trimmed its memory and it makes you sure that it is a network problem rather than any other issue like resource management issue, then you need to go for your phone’s preferred network mode. Unfortunately, the location of this setting varies from device to device, but you need to try looking into the settings regarding the network connectivity so that issue will get resolved.
From menu, GSM is 2G and WCDMA is 3G. This is the common default setting, “GSM/WCDMA/LTE auto,” and the network in your phone keep changing and it depends upon the highest tier currently available. Also in some places the 4G network is very slow, while 3G remains strong and works very fast. If you change you network to GSM/WCDMA auto, that means the 4G network can no longer work untill you want to change your network settings back to 4G network and till then you can only use 2G and 3G network. If in case you want to check that which ones work best then you need to change settings again which takes few seconds to go into effect so mae sure you give each Network some time.
