How to Disable Android Bloatware Without Rooting Your Phone

BY GreenBot Staff

Published 13 May 2014

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There are only a few things in our digital lives worse than the extraneous apps. That come bundled with new Android devices. Carriers and manufacturers install the bulk of this bloatware. Making it all but impossible to remove the apps from your devices. Because if you can’t remove it, perhaps you’ll actually use it. Or so their thinking goes. But you don’t need three versions of a calendar app or a cloud storage locker you never opted for. Luckily, you don’t have to be a victim or go through the process of rooting your phone. To excise this software from your app tray home screen. Here’s a simple way to disable those apps. And keep them from reminding you they ever existed in the first place.

Lock ‘em off, One by One

scale 2 — One of these apps doesn’t belong.

The key to getting rid of the bloatware is in the Settings panel. Under Applications or App manager on some Android versions. Swipe to the right to see all of the applications installed on your device. From here, you can select individual apps to force stop or disable. Hitting Force stop is helpful if you want to temporarily kill the app. And relaunch it again, hopefully clearing up some erratic behavior. But if you want to remove the program from your app tray entirely, choose the Disable button.

scale 3 — Android will flash a warning your way before you delete an app. Definitely consider it before you tap OK.

You can check if you were successful. By looking for the Disabled marker next to the app on the same screen.

storage 5 — The app has been disabled all is well with the world again.

Kill Off a Whole Group

If your version of Android supports it, the screenshots in this article portray Sense 6 on the HTC One (M8). You might be able to batch search for applications you’re trying to kick off your device.

scale 4 — Sorry, Verizon, but I’m not too interested in your Tones. I can make my own for free.

Unfortunately, stock Android doesn’t yet support this search functionality. Then again, if you’re running a phone with a bone stock version of Android. You’re probably not dealing with much bloatware in the first place. The only caveat of using this method to tuck away unused apps. But They still take up precious phone storage space. They’ll stay out of sight but won’t be out of mind, as it were. Apps provided by carriers and manufacturers often can’t be removed by disabling. So you’ll have to resort to rooting to eliminate the unwanted software entirely.