5 Android Settings You Should Change Right Now
When you set up an Android phone, you tap through a series of screens, agree to things you don't fully read, and end up with a device that works — but isn't really working for you. It's working for Google. It's working for app developers. It's working for ad networks. You're somewhere further down the list.
None of this requires a factory reset or any technical knowledge. Five settings. Fifteen minutes. Your phone will be faster, more private, and considerably less annoying by the time you're done.
Let's go.
1. Delete Your Advertising ID — Stop Apps From Tracking Everything You Do
This is the one most people have never heard of, and it's probably the most important change on this list.
Every Android phone comes assigned a unique Advertising ID — a string of characters that Google and third-party apps use to track your behaviour across different apps and build a profile about you. That profile is what makes ads follow you around the internet. You look at a pair of shoes on one app, and suddenly you're seeing shoe ads everywhere else. That's your Advertising ID doing its job.
The good news is you can delete it entirely, and Google actually lets you do this.
Go to Settings → Privacy → Ads. You'll see an option that says Delete Advertising ID. Tap it, confirm, and it's gone. Apps can still show you ads, but they lose the ability to connect your behaviour across different apps and build that persistent profile. You go from being a tracked individual to being an anonymous user. That's a meaningful privacy improvement.
While you're in that same menu, you'll also see toggles for Ad Topics, App-Suggested Ads, and Ad Measurement. Turn all of them off. Takes thirty seconds and removes several more layers of tracking you didn't consent to when you bought the phone.
2. Switch Location Access to "Only While Using" — For Every App That Doesn't Need It
Open your phone right now and think about how many apps have access to your location. Most people, when they actually check, are genuinely surprised by the answer.
Go to Settings → Location → App Permissions. You'll see a list split into three categories: apps allowed to access location all the time, apps allowed only while in use, and apps denied entirely. The "all the time" list is the one worth scrutinising.
For most apps, there is no legitimate reason to know where you are when you're not actively using them. A food delivery app needs your location when you're ordering, not at 2am when the app is closed and you're asleep. A shopping app has no business knowing your location in the background. A game definitely doesn't.
Move everything that isn't maps, navigation, or emergency services to Only While Using or Don't Allow. For any app where you're unsure, ask yourself one question: does this app need to know where I am right now, in the background, without me actively using it? If the answer is anything other than an obvious yes, change it.
Beyond privacy, this has a measurable impact on battery life. Background location access is one of the more consistent battery drains on Android. Cutting it off from apps that don't need it adds up.
3. Turn Off "Usage & Diagnostics" — Stop Sending Data You Never Agreed To Send
This one is buried deep enough that most people never find it, which is perhaps not a coincidence.
By default, your Android phone continuously sends information about how you use it back to Google — which apps you open, how often, how long you use them, what errors occur, how your device behaves. This is framed as helping improve Android, which may even be true. But it's still your data, leaving your phone in the background without you actively choosing to send it.
To turn it off, go to Settings → Google, tap the three-dot menu in the top right corner, and select Usage & Diagnostics. Switch it off.
On Samsung phones, the equivalent is under Settings → Privacy → Send Diagnostic Data, and there's usually a separate toggle for Customization Service nearby — turn that off too. On other Android skins, search "diagnostics" in the Settings search bar and it should surface.
This won't make your phone faster in a way you'll notice day to day, but it stops a quiet, continuous data transfer that you were probably unaware of. That feels like a reasonable change to make.
4. Enable "Power Off Verify" — Make Your Phone Harder to Steal
Here's the scenario. Someone grabs your phone. The very first thing they do — before you've had a chance to log into Find My Device, before you've called your number, before you've done anything — is power it off. The moment it's off, you can't track it. You can't remotely lock it. You can't erase it. It becomes a brick with your data on it.
Power Off Verify prevents this. When this setting is enabled, your phone requires your PIN or fingerprint before it can be powered off while the screen is locked. A thief who doesn't have your credentials cannot turn your phone off. It stays on. It stays trackable. You stay in control.
The setting is available on most Android phones from OnePlus, Nothing, Oppo, Vivo, Xiaomi, and Realme. Go to Settings → Security & Privacy → More Security Settings and look for Power Off Verify or Require Password to Power Off. Enable it.
Notably, Google Pixel phones don't currently have this feature built in. If you're on a Pixel, this one doesn't apply — but it's worth knowing if you ever switch.
To confirm it's working, lock your screen and then try powering off. Your phone should ask for your PIN before it shuts down. If it does, you're protected.
5. Reduce Animation Scale to 0.5x — Make Your Phone Feel Instantly Faster
This is the setting that everyone's sceptical about until they try it, and then they can never go back.
Every time you open an app, close an app, switch between screens, or pull down the notification shade, Android plays a small animation. These animations make the OS feel polished and fluid. They also take time — usually between 300 and 500 milliseconds per animation. That sounds negligible. It isn't. Across hundreds of interactions per day, that added time accumulates into something you can feel as sluggishness, even on a fast phone.
Cutting the animation speed in half makes the phone feel dramatically more responsive without changing any underlying performance.
To do it, you first need to unlock Developer Options. Go to Settings → About Phone → Build Number and tap it seven times in a row. Enter your PIN when prompted. Developer Options will appear in your Settings.
Open Developer Options and search for three settings: Window Animation Scale, Transition Animation Scale, and Animator Duration Scale. All three are set to 1x by default. Change all three to 0.5x.
The effect is immediate. Your phone doesn't get faster — it was already fast. But now it feels fast, because the visual transitions that used to make interactions feel slow are now twice as quick. It's the best zero-cost speed improvement you can make on any Android device, regardless of how new or old it is.
Five Settings, One Afternoon
None of these take more than a few minutes individually. Together, they represent a meaningful shift in how your phone treats you — less as a data source for advertisers, more as an actual user who owns the device.
Delete the Advertising ID. Audit your location permissions. Switch off Usage & Diagnostics. Enable Power Off Verify. Cut animation scales to 0.5x.
That's it. Your phone will feel snappier, behave more privately, and be harder to steal. Not a bad return on fifteen minutes of your time.
