Introduction
Android is the most popular and well-known brand of mobile operating system. Many people still remember when there were only two choices: iOS and Android. But now, there are a ton of different Android-based phones, each with its own unique features and advantages. What used to be four different brands of phones have been combined under one roof — Google’s Pixel and Android line are the company’s brand-new phone option.
Have you unwrapped your holiday-gifted smartphone yet? While switching phones might be thrilling, it can also be stressful. On Christmas morning, you have to remember to back up everything and remember your account logins. We can assist you if you’ve carefully postponed switching for a few days. With little to no hassle, our Android Authority testers have mastered moving between smartphones every few weeks. The process to switch from one Android phone to another is as follows.
Precautions to take before switching to a new phone
Before upgrading your phone, make sure you have a copy of all of your important data, including contacts, photos, and other files. So that you can quickly swap out your phone’s data, we’ll go through the steps necessary to do so. There is a separate guide for backing up your Android phone for security purposes, but this article will focus on backups and getting ready for changing phones and transferring data.
In addition, you must guarantee a seamless transition by having both your old and new phones fully charged and ready to go. To facilitate the process of upgrading from an older device, several manufacturers provide adapter cables or dongles. If so, that’s great, but that isn’t always the case, and many users are switching to older phones without proprietary connections or dongles.
Embrace the usage of WiFi. There will soon be a lot of downloads and uploads, thus it is recommended that you use Wi-Fi rather than your carrier’s or network’s data if at all possible. The Wi-Fi password for your new phone should be ready and waiting.
Ready to make the jump to Android from the iPhone? This is the better resource; however, you might also consult this one: Substituting an Android phone for an iPhone.
Preliminary Words of Wisdom: Don’t wipe for as long as possible: You should delay wiping your old phone for as long as you can. Sometimes, you just have to use the old phone one more time for reasons you can’t predict. For security reasons, certain banking apps will only allow one device at a time to be authorized, and will not accept a second device until the first one has been physically unpaired. It’s possible that the app market may be difficult to navigate, so holding out on upgrading your phone for a week or two might save you time in the customer service queue. Even if that’s the worst-case scenario, it’s something we’ve really considered.
Set up a backup program
If you aren’t already, you should use the free Google tools available to make backup plans. Using Google Photos and Google Drive, backing up your photos, movies, and other information is a breeze.
One of Google Drive’s many strengths is that it enables users to save files on their mobile devices and then access those files from almost anywhere. After signing in with your Google account, the app will automatically upload all of your cloud-stored documents to your new device.
Google Photos gives you the option of syncing all of your mobile device’s photos and videos to the cloud. Remember that Google Photos isn’t really free. Your Google Drive capacity will be reduced according to the number of media you upload. Absolutely no one is charged for the first 15 GB. If you need more capacity, you may join Google One and pay for more storage.
Text messages are reliably archived in Google Messages. However, it’s possible that MMS will be lost forever. SMS Backup & Restore is highly recommended by the community.
Make use of the app’s native backup features
Complex programs that save crucial data should have their own backups. If you use WhatsApp for sending messages, you can set it up such that it automatically saves a copy of your conversations to your Google Drive account. Telegram, unlike Signal, syncs across devices when a user logs in, whereas Signal relies on local storage.
If you have papers, photos, or a special vault app, you should verify every app that potentially contain them to be sure they aren’t being stored anywhere else.
Methods for using Android’s in-built backup feature to move information from one device to another
Google has spent the previous several years refining Android’s backup and restore capability, making it simple to make the conversion to Android. As long as you have the option if you have automatic backup for your phone set to information from your apps, phone’s memory, contacts, settings, and even SMS messages to your Google Drive.
By heading to Settings > Google > Backup and then choosing Backup by Google One, you may enable complete backups on your Android device. It’s important to remember that the specific instructions may vary depending on the kind of phone you’re using. Even while Android phones back up data invisibly in the background, users may initiate a backup at any time by tapping the Back up now button.
If you choose this way, Google will give you the option to recover all of your data from the cloud as soon as you begin the setup process on a new Android phone. The device will automatically replicate your data from the most recent backup you specify.
Note that backups created in newer versions of Android cannot be restored on previous versions of Android. Because the system expects you’ll always be updating, you can’t use a backup from Android 12 on a device running Android 10. In any case, if you’re having issues like these, you should upgrade to Android 11 first. Unfortunately, some waiting is inevitable.
ADB save
Only advanced users and engineers should consider utilizing the Android debug bridge (ADB) tool developed by Google, which is one of the less well-known backup options. The majority of your phone’s information and programs can be backed up. You can even retrieve and restore the backup file from your computer, making it suitable for use with any Android smartphone. Then you may install the same file on numerous phones at once, and you’ll have greater control over your backup choices.
Due to the complexity of utilizing Google’s developer tools, we recommend only using this method if you are already familiar with ADB or are comfortable doing things slowly and carefully.
The Android Software Development Kit (SDK) must be downloaded and installed on your computer before you can begin. Start by enabling USB debugging and developer settings on your mobile device. The next step is to establish a successful ADB connection between your device and PC.
In the Terminal or Command Prompt, enter filepath>/backup.ab, adb backup -apk -shared -all -f filepath>, then hit enter. There should then be a new tab or window available on your Android smartphone. Here is where you’ll be able to lock down your backup with a password and get things rolling.
Keep the screen from going to sleep while you’re backing up your phone. As a result, your device will cease functioning and not store any data.
Launch the adb restore filepath>/backup.ab command after you have your new device connected and set up. You’ll get a similar prompt on your phone, asking whether you want to restore the data you’ve backed up. After waiting a few minutes, you should have a somewhat similar experience on your new device.
To make matters worse, ADB copies aren’t flawless. Some people choose to avoid using cloud storage in favor of keeping a copy of their data on their own device. There may still be gaps in coverage.
Here’s how to copy applications from one Android device to another.
The process of transferring applications is simple and offers a number of possibilities.
Utilizing archived data
The first thing to do after you’ve successfully backed up your device is to provide Android access to your backups. This contains a record of the software packages currently installed on your current or previous mobile device. When you get a new Android phone, it will reinstall all of the applications from the Google Play Store. The bad news is that not all applications will remember your login information. That was deliberate design on the part of the developers; sorry about that!
Enter your collection in the Google Play store.
When transferring phones, you may not want to transfer all of your applications. Most of the time, it’s better to start with a blank slate and not use that feature. However, you still had easy access to the programs you had previously installed. To accomplish this, open the Google Play Store and go to the Profile icon, followed by Manage Apps & Device, and finally Manage. Choose “Uninstalled” from the Installed option that appears. A history of your app downloads will be shown to you. Mark the boxes next to the ones you wish to download and then click the Download button.
All the apps you’ve ever downloaded to any of your linked devices will be shown here. It’s possible that this list of long-lost pals may force you to make a number of snap judgments as you go. Depending on the number of clicks required, doing the same task from a computer connected to the internet might either save time or slow you down.
Always remember your 2FA and passwords.
When moving from one device to another, entering again into each individual app is a major source of frustration. Possibility of logging in using a Google ID has been introduced by several developers (or other social media accounts). Numerous sites, though, call for user IDs and passwords that you’ll need to keep in mind.
To save and organize your passwords in a safe and secure manner, try using a password manager like LastPass or 1Password, which is the quickest, simplest, and safest method to handle all of these passwords and logins at once. Not only can you establish and save passwords of incredible complexity with these services, but you can also use the applications to easily copy and paste your credentials into the appropriate fields. The auto-fill API is unfortunately not supported by all apps. This means you’ll need to use the password manager directly to copy the password.
Conclusion
Android is still around and it might be well-established as a leader in the mobile OS industry, but it’s not the only one with a shot at taking over the world. There are other operating systems out there with their own unique value proposition and it might be worth giving them a try if your experience with Android is going south. It’s important to remember that switching operating systems doesn’t mean you have to stop using apps, devices or services that are specific to one operating system. It just means you’ll be using a different one. So, if you’re looking for a phone that just works, without any complications, then the Pixel is the one for you.
