Android is a very advanced OS and it has a lot of features but maybe you missed some of them.

Here a list of the top 10 most useful Android tips you maybe don’t know about.

1) Move apps to SD card

Most of our Android devices has SD Card support and it’s a good idea to move our apps to it and keep Internal Storage free.

You need to consider that some apps like widgets can’t be moved to SD Card for technical reasons.

You can move an app to SD Card by going to Settings => Applications then select the app and click on Move to SD Card button.

2) Clear default apps

How often do you set a new app as default for a particular action?

If we want to choose a new app to take the role of the old one, we need to follow a simple procedure.

You need to go do Settings => Applications then select the app and click on Clear defaults.

3) Reboot Android in safe mode (Jelly Bean only)

This is a new feature available in Android that will let you run the OS without all the 3rd party apps.

You can use this mode to uninstall apps that give you instability problems to your Android device.

You need to Long press Power button and when the menu will show you Long tap on Reboot or Power Off menu.

It will confirm to reboot into safe mode.

4) Customize Unlock screen

You can customize how you unlock your screen. There are different way to unlock your screen.

You can unlock using Slide, Pattern, Face Unlock (Jelly Bean only), PIN and Password.

To configure it you just need to go to Settings => Security => Screen lock and choose the method you like.

5) One tap direct dial

You can setup a shortcut on your home screen to call directly a contact with a single tap.

• Android 4.0 or later : Tap on app drawer and select Widgets tab. Search for Direct Dial widget and long tap on it. It will let you move that widget where you want on the Home screen. After you position it you’ll select the contact from the contact list.
• Previous Android versions : you need to long tapping on an empty space of your Home Screen, select Shortcuts then Direct Dial. It will prompt contact list and you’ll select the contact you like.

6) Take a screenshot

Android from version 4.0 provide built in feature to take a screenshot of the screen.

The most common buttons combinations are:

• Power button + Home button.
• Power button + Volume down button.

If you are on a previous version of Android you can try this app (For some smartphones it requires root permissions):

7) Offline voice recognition (Jelly Bean only)

Android from version 4.1 provide speech voice recognition available offline.

To setup it you need to go to Settings => Language & input =>Voice Search and tap on Download offline speech recognition

8) Control your data usage

If your Android version is 4.0 or above you can control the data usage for mobile data or WiFi. It will display total data usage and specific data usage for each application.

You can even set a limit of the data usage for mobile data.

To do that you need to go to Settings => Data usage and enable Mobile data and Set mobile data limit.

9) Find your smartphone IMEI

You can easily find your smartphone IMEI tapping the following code on your keypad *#06#

10) Freeze/Hibernate apps to improve speed, free memory and battery life

If you have slow downs on your Android device after you install some apps you maybe should try Greenify (it requires root permissions).

Greenify is an app that will hibernate the selected apps in order to avoid wasting CPU, memory and battery life.

Check out my post about it here:

http://techcookies.net/greenify-improve-speed-and-battery-life-of-your-android-device/

I hope these tips will improve your knowledge of this wonderful OS.