The 8 Best Ways to Reduce Android App Size

With the growth in mobile storage, that has been increased to 256GB, and the size of apps is increasing. The size of apps is likely to increase as developers introduce new features, striving to meet the demands of their customers and trying to allow their apps to run on different sizes of screens. About 74% of the world's population uses Android, and 70 percent of people consider the size of their apps before installing them.

In addition, as we are becoming used to instant speed, they are pondering how to download apps, as they occupy storage space. Despite cloud support for video, images, and files, Android users have issues, such as mobile hangs because of app size. With customers' increasing expectations, app developers for Android are looking for ways to decrease the size of their apps and still incorporate significant additional features while keeping in mind the user experience.

Here are the Best Eight Methods to Decrease the Android App Size:

Utilize the Android App Bundle to reduce the size of your app

If you are creating the version that is released for your app, you can select between an APK or the Android Application Bundle. The other option allows Google Play to create an APK that only includes features that a particular user requires.

App Bundle vs. APK

Android App Bundle

• It's a publishing format that includes compiled code and resources for your application and delays APK generation and signing into Google Play.
• When using Android App Bundles, the compression limit for downloads is 150 MB. The app bundle is not utilized with APK expansion files.

How do you build Android app bundles?

To create app bundles, follow these steps:

• Install Android Studio 3.2 or higher—It's the easiest method to include features modules and create bundles of apps.
• Include Support for Play Feature Delivery by including the base module, which organises codes and resources for configuring APKs and, in addition, adding feature modules.
• Build your Android app Bundle by using Android Studio. It is also possible to deploy your application to a device connected to the app bundle by altering your run/debug configuration before deploying an APK via the app bundle. Be aware that the use of this method can result in longer build times as compared to the process of building and deploying an APK.
• If you don't have the IDE, alternatively, you could create an app bundle via the command line.
• Check out Your Android App Bundle, making APKs installable on a device.
• Sign up for the app App Signing in Play.Otherwise, you will be unable to upload your app bundle to the Play Console.Play Console.
• Upload your app bundle to Google Play.
• The Android operating system runs APK, which is the format used by package files to allow the distribution and installation of mobile games, apps, and middleware. APK is like other software packages, such as APPX for Microsoft Windows or a Debian package that runs on Debian-based operating systems.
• Google Play requires that the compressed APK downloaded by users should not exceed 100MB.
• The expansion files of your application are stored via Google Play, which saves them to your device for free. They are stored in the shared storage location of the device (the SD card or USB-mountable partition).

Use Proguard.

Proguard is likely to be one of the most effective tools to reduce the size of your APK. It can reduce the source code to a minimum. It has the ability to reduce APK size by up to 90%.

• Make use of it in all its variations anytime you use "Proguard."
• It helps to prevent conflict in generating an APK or bundle in the event it is to be used in all variants.
• We cannot allow ProGuard to change the name or eliminate the fields in these data classes since they need to be compatible with the serialization format. It is a good idea to include an annotation with the keep tag on the entire class or to add a wildcard rule to every model you have.

Use the Android Size Analyzer Plugin

• It is an Android Studio plugin that will provide you with suggestions to minimize its size. App. With the APK Analyzer, you can do the following things:
• Check the size and final dimensions of the files within the APK, including those in the DEX and Android resource files.
• Know the components of DEX files.
• You can quickly check out the latest versions of files within the APK, for instance, the AndroidManifest.xml file.
• Do a comparison side-by-side of two APKs.

The three methods to use the APK Analyzer if a project is currently open are:

• Drag the APK to the editor window in Android Studio.
• Then switch to the Project view in the Project window. Double-click the APK within the build/output/apks default directory.
• Choose Building > Analyze APK on the menu bar, then choose your APK.

Optimize the resources of your app.

If it is used or not, any resource consumes memory. Therefore, ensuring you have only the resources you will need to utilize them efficiently is essential. That is why you must consider the resolution of your image before deciding on its resolution.

Optimize Libraries.

Large libraries consume enormous quantities of space; it's recommended to eliminate a portion of them if you don't require them and if it's permissible by the terms of the license for the library. Proguard can assist you in this way. However, it is not always able to eliminate huge internal dependencies.

Make use of vector graphics wherever possible.

They're sharp and don't take up large amounts of space since they are based on mathematical calculations; they do not depend on pixels that require to be saved. However, they are not utilized for photography.

Images should be compressed.

Utilizing tools like pngcrush, you can reduce the size of PNG images. It is advised to use this because they appear identical.

Only supports specific densities.

Suppose only a tiny fraction of users utilize a certain density. In that case, it may be best that you let Android scale different densities to accommodate them, as it will minimize the APK size.

With the amount of storage available on mobile devices, people are installing various apps to satisfy various requirements. As app sizes are growing, users continue to be faced with issues related to storage. With tools like Proguard, you can easily reduce the APK file size and improve libraries. Utilizing compression techniques and graphs in vectors helps reduce the size of apps.

To End...

The lessons you've learned to date:

• The reason Android apps have become popular over the years is
• The reason why it is important to focus on app size is
• How can you decrease the Android app size both during and after development?

Remember that the smaller the app, the higher the download rate. So, follow these suggestions by the Android App Development Companyand tighten the application window to the maximum extent possible.

In the end, if you've read this far in this post, we're pretty sure you're the developer who's unhappy about mobile apps squandering disc space and attracting scorn from potential users.

Start today!