Why does Instagram use so much storage?

Instagram needs no introduction to most people. According to Statistic Brain, about 60 million photos are being uploaded to this app daily.

These are a lot of photos on your Instagram feed assuming that you follow several people including influencers, celebrities, and your friends. As a result of scrolling through the feed checking photos, Instagram takes up storage space just like any other app would when used. This isn’t that noticeable to most users because most of us never check our phone storage until we receive that notification of our phone storage running low. We are forced to either uninstall apps or delete media from the phone, for iPhone users, you may be required to purchase more storage. Does Instagram consume a lot of storage space? Yes. So, Why?

Instagram uses so much storage because when you browse through the pictures and videos on your live feed, the photos are cached and stored on your phone’s storage. This prevents re-downloading of these images which you’ve already viewed so that it’s faster to view them again without them being loaded again using cellular data or Wi-Fi. Over time, this cache gets quite large and eats a huge chunk of your storage space.

What’s cache?

Cache comes from caching which is a way for applications such as games, a web browser, or a streaming service to temporarily store some of their files that are deemed important and relevant to make the loading time faster and giving you the best user experience. The cache can be your search history, a thumbnail, or a video clip snippet stored temporarily to prevent asking a user to type in the information again or loading the same information from the internet again.

The overall role of a cache is to save on time and internet speeds. By storing this data on your phone memory, it consumes a lot of space which in the long run may slow your device or app.

How to clear cache

Clearing cache can save over 50% of the storage space consumed by Instagram. To clear cache, follow the steps below;

On Android

Go to Settings on your android device and select ‘Apps & Notifications’. From the list of apps displayed, tap on Instagram to view its details. You should be able to see how much storage space it has taken in general under the ‘Storage’ label. Nice click on ‘Storage’ to open the breakdown of storage space. You should see two buttons labeled ‘Clear Data’ and Clear Cache’ right below the app’s name. Below these buttons is a breakdown of how the app uses your phone storage. Check the data used by the cache and then click on the ‘Clear Cache button’ to clear it. Do not ‘Clear Data’ unless you’re sure because by clicking this option, you’ll reset your Instagram app to how it was when you first installed it. You will be required to log in again and set it up.

iOS

For iPhone, it’s not as straightforward and you’ll be required to login to your Instagram account when you’re done clearing the cache. You can check how much storage the app is taking up by going to the Settings app on your iPhone and open it. Navigate to ‘General’ and select ‘Storage &iCloud Usage’ or on other iPhone versions, ‘iPhone Storage’. Next, click on ‘Manage Storage’ and wait for all the stored data to load. Now scroll down and locate Instagram and how much space it takes next to the title. The only sure way to clear the cache on iPhone is by deleting Instagram and installing it again. Tap on Instagram and then click the ‘Delete App’ button. Weh prompted to confirm whether you want to remove Instagram, tap on ‘Delete App’ again and wait for the uninstallation to be complete. Go to the App Store and install Instagram again.

How about clearing my search history instead

This is another hack of clearing some cache without deleting Instagram. When you search on Instagram, the app caches your search and makes a search history. So every time you go to the search bar to search the same thing as the previous, you won’t have to type it in full since the app auto completes it. To clear your search history, tap on your profile picture, and select the Settings icon on the profile screen to access the Options screen. Scroll down to the bottom of the app screen and click on ‘Clear Search History’. This will clear your search history.

FAQs

What would happen if I cleared my Instagram data on Android?

When you clear cache, your Instagram settings, username and password, and preferences stay intact while clearing data will delete all this and reset the app to its default state of how it was when you first installed it.

Is cache important?

Yes, cache is important to the app’s functionality because it reduces the loading time of data you have accessed before which then saves you data. This is because it doesn’t have to load this content again.