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can widgets effect performance of phone?

Robert7107

Android Enthusiast
Sep 30, 2011
326
37
cameron park ca
wondering if by having too many widgets on my home screens can impact the phones performance? i have 6 but only one updates and that is every 3 hrs.. was told by a co worker that by having too many regardless if they update or not can bog down your phone making it slow and choppy.. i have noticed a few times the phone will hesitate..

att samsung note 3
 
Any choppiness is more likely Samsung's Touchwiz software ;)

No, seriously, if you have a lot of large, complex widgets then sure, they are using resources and eventually this will have an impact on performance. But 6 is not a lot, especially on a device as powerful as a Note 3. I always used more than that on my old HTC Desire, and the 7 I'm running on my One (with less RAM and a slower processor than your Note) is about the smallest number I've ever used. So unless they are all particularly demanding widgets I'd not think they'd cause problems for that phone.
 
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The first thing ...

Temporary files are stored in the cache partition and it can become corrupted over time causing slow or erratic response times, increased CPU use, and poorer battery life.

Everyone should wipe cache partition periodically. It removes temporary files. It does not touch any app you installed or data you saved.

I wipe cache partition once a week.

... Thom
 
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Widgets often don't affect performance, but some will chew through battery. HD Widgets tends to use over 20% when used, and Zooper tends to showcase bad wakelocks.

TouchWiz isn't laggy in my experience, unless it's on a low-spec device like the S2, when it was not nearly optimized like the version used on the S5, which is a lot less bloated.
 
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all i know is when HD Widgets were in use, the battery was at 'low battery' alert mode at ~20 percent or less after a day at work (10 hours), and when i removed them from my screens (but left them installed as an app) the remaining battery jumped to 45-50 percent in contrast. battery stats when in use showed it consuming anywhere from 15-20% but removing the widgets from the home screens made that entry disappear entirely.

Zooper Pro kept doing some weird wakelock thing that made the lockscreen lag and also refuse to respond to touch. it'd update but not respond to my finger swiping at it.

Currently my worst offender at the very top of the list of battery stats is 'Google Services'. yet i never use Play Store and only have Google+ set to update. Google Services is the top consumer at 25%, with 'Android OS' being second, and screen being at the very bottom at a paltry 5% (i use my Gear 2 more than my phone at work.
 
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Just to clarify my previous post, the setting is in HD Widgets.

I don't use Google+ anymore but when I did the battery wasn't that bad. I never see Google anything in stats (I don't let play auto-update or notify me).

Here's a screenshot for today, light use, screen time is just over an hour.

uploadfromtaptalk1407024237715.jpg
 
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