Android users urged to streamline SMS and media backups to save Google storage

Android devices include a built-in backup feature that can store SMS messages in a user's Google account, allowing easy restoration when switching phones or after a reset. Enabling the SMS option in the Google backup settings and performing a manual backup ensures that text conversations, codes and other important information are preserved.

A separate issue affects many Android users: WhatsApp media is often saved twice—once by WhatsApp itself and again by Google Photos if the WhatsApp folder is included in the phone‑wide photo backup. This duplication can consume dozens of gigabytes of cloud storage. Users can keep WhatsApp chat backups while preventing Google Photos from backing up the WhatsApp media folder, eliminating redundant files and freeing space.