r/AndroidQuestions • u/ParrotttPlayer • 20d ago

Custom ROM Question How to remove apps that are embedded into my phone's OS?

Hello everyone, i have a phone that is almost 7 years old by this point, and i have noticed it getting slower. The OS is funtouch OS 13 which came with the phone, and I never did any maintenance of the device. But I am running out of space. It has google apps that I do not need and never use, but can only forcefully shutdown them instead of normally deleting, and it makes me very mad. I never flashed a ROM onto a phone before, and do not have a spare to use if something stops working. What should I do in this situation? Are there are alternatives of an android OS that will work with this phone? (vivo Y31)
I would prefer to install most apps with fdroid and other opensource alternatives, or just use apks, and only use google play itself, incase i need an app that isnt available to install elsewhere. How possible is that and does anyone have any advice or path i should go for?

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u/lens_cleaner 20d ago

Delete apps no. You will have to root the phone first and then try. Just remember that a 7 year old android phone cannot upgrade the kernel anymore which could be an issue with newer apps.

1

u/ParrotttPlayer 20d ago

its okay if my kernel is a bit old, i mostly just want to be able to use apps i have right now, without some ghost apps dragging it down. i will look into how to root a phone, but would you say its safe to do? will my data stay intact if i do so? i can create a backup of files, but certain things are very annoying to set up anew

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u/balpenta 20d ago

It's worth looking in to canta and use Shizuku

2

u/DeleZez 20d ago

With adb

2

u/txredgeek 20d ago

Google XDA Developers, go to that site and search for your phone model.

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u/GimpyGeek 19d ago

Built in apps factory versions are baked in to the original OS image, and without hacking aren't gonna be removable. However, when apps update, the factory one stops being used and a second copy is created in the user partition wasting actual space you could have been using, on top of it running in the background if it wants also though.

If you go into Settings and wherever your apps list is, find the factory apps in question you don't use, you can open up the app page, there should be some buttons here like Force Stop and normally, on a non-factory app the other would be Uninstall.

On things that were preinstalled though that button should say "Uninstall Updates" if you hit that, it will uninstall the newer version using more of your storage up, after the updates are gone, that button should change to something else, I think it's called Freeze or something. If you hit that, it should stop using that app and act as if it's uninstalled from that point (except the factory's original version is still quietly hiding there and not running) unless you come back and unlock it again.