With modern phones serving as a one-stop shop for all forms of media, it’s extremely easy to see your device’s internal memory filling up with music, photos, videos, and apps. The easiest way to fix this problem is to simply get more storage using an SD card. But some smartphone brands have stopped using SD card slots, and not everyone wants to spend money on this type of specialized storage. Fortunately, there are other ways to expand your device’s reserves. You can use cloud storage services or invest in other physical storage formats, like portable SSDs and USB drives.
With data space being a very persistent concern in the smartphone space, there are naturally many different ways to manage it. SD cards are certainly the simplest and most discreet option, and some modern devices still rely on them. But if you can’t use them (or just don’t have one), you don’t need to start wiping out all the files from your phone’s internal memory just yet – although it certainly wouldn’t hurt to do a little cleaning.
Use cloud storage and other types of physical storage
If you want to expand your phone’s storage without spending too much money, look into cloud storage solutions. If you just want to move a few miscellaneous photos and videos from your phone, the 15GB of free storage you get using Google Drive is more than enough. You can access Drive on an Android smartphone through its dedicated app, so it’s simple to move files back and forth. If you ever need more storage, you can sign up for a basic subscription to Google One, which gives you 100 GB of storage for $1.99 per month.
Of course, since there are certain types of files that you shouldn’t upload to cloud storage, not everyone feels comfortable storing private data such as photos there. If you prefer to use physical storage, it doesn’t have to be an SD card; USB drives and portable SSDs are readily available as alternatives. A classic USB key, especially USB-C compatible, can be plugged directly into the port on your phone. At this point, you can move files back and forth using your phone’s dedicated file browser app. USB drives can have storage space ranging from several gigabytes to a terabyte, although they don’t have the best read/write speeds.
If you’re moving large amounts of data and don’t want to wait for it all day, a portable SSD is a great choice, offering comparable storage space with much faster read/write speeds. Additionally, some portable SSDs are MagSafe compatible, which is perfect for improving data capacity on a current-generation iPhone. But these physical options can quickly become expensive, even as some brands try to spare consumers from soaring memory prices.
