How I deleted hundreds of old photos on my Android in seconds with the Sponge app – for free

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ZDNET’s key takeaways

• If you’ll want to clear house in your cellphone, Sponge has you lined.
• This app makes deleting outdated images so quick and straightforward.
• The app is free, until you’ll want to delete movies and/or collections.

I do not find out about you, however my cellphone — a Pixel 9 Pro — is chock-full of images and movies I’ve taken through the years, and so they take up a variety of house. Huge quantities of house. Star Trek Discovery-levels of house.

Each occasionally, I understand that it is time to filter the cruft, which implies going by means of the tedious process of deleting images utilizing the Google Pictures app.

Aaack! (IYKYK.)

I’ve performed this numerous occasions, and it by no means fails to take for much longer than I’ve any persistence for.

Till now.

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I just lately found an app with one function: to make deleting images and movies as environment friendly as potential. In actual fact, the Sponge app takes a moderately Tinder-like strategy to deleting images: swipe left to delete, swipe proper to maintain.

However Sponge takes this one step additional by letting you delete particular person images, images by date, or images by assortment.

With a single swipe, you may clear away these images and/or movies that you just not need. It is really easy that the primary time I used it, I could not assist however snicker. I might been so accustomed to the Google Pictures manner of eradicating pics that having one thing exponentially sooner and simpler was a breath of contemporary air.

On high of that, you may configure Sponge to remind you to delete images.

Candy.

One factor to bear in mind is that Sponge solely deletes images out of your native machine, not these in your Google Cloud account. That is good as a result of it means you may all the time have a backup of the images you delete.

One other caveat is that the free model can solely delete images, and solely by the month. If you’ll want to add video deletion (and picture deletion by assortment), you need to pay for the Premium model, which is a one-time (in-app) fee of $3.49.

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By utilizing Sponge along side emptying your Android Recycle Bin, it can save you some severe space for storing in your machine.

Getting Sponge

Sponge is discovered on the Google Play Store and is free to put in. To put in it, open the Play Retailer app, seek for Sponge, faucet the entry (its official title is Sponge – Gallery Cleaner), then faucet Set up. Sponge is put in in seconds and able to go.

Are you able to “Sponge” clear your cellphone of images and movies you not want?

Let me present you ways.

Utilizing Sponge

Open the app, then faucet “View all” close to the center. You may see your images listed by month, beginning with the oldest. Begin by tapping a month to disclose the images contained inside.

For every picture, swipe left to delete it or proper to put it aside. As you swipe, you may be offered with the subsequent picture. Whenever you end that month, you may see a web page asking whether or not you need to delete the images completely now or resolve later. Faucet “Delete eternally,” and you will be offered with a Mission Completed web page, which exhibits you what number of pictures you reviewed and the way a lot house you saved.

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Transfer on to the subsequent month and proceed the method.

I deleted lots of of images in lower than a minute, and it felt actually good.

After utilizing Sponge for simply a few days, I made a decision it was essential app, because it made clearing house on my Android cellphone a lot extra environment friendly.

Month-to-month reminders

When you’re one who tends to overlook to do such duties, you may be glad to know that Sponge can remind you (by way of a pop-up in your Notification Shade) each month to purge images.

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To allow this characteristic, faucet the three-line menu button on the high left nook of the app, faucet Settings, after which faucet the On/Off slider for “Month-to-month reminder.”

When you repeatedly have to delete outdated or undesirable images in your Android cellphone, you’ll not discover a neater manner to take action than Sponge. Set up this app, use it, and save your self a variety of effort and time.