Weekly poll results: most people are fine with 256GB storage on their phones

Last week we asked you how much storage you use on your phone. It turns out most can fit within 256GB total. “Total” because we also queried you about your thoughts on microSD slots on phones.

Here’s the breakdown. Just over 40% of people can squeeze in 128GB or less. That said, 36% need at least 256GB. This means 128GB models are still viable, but you should be looking at a phone with more room if you want to keep it for a long time.

A freshly set up phone is fairly lean, but cruft starts to accumulate pretty fast. Photos you snapped quickly and didn’t intend to keep, images coming in from instant messaging apps, app cache and other things eat into your storage.

You can manage those things, of course. There are automated tools to help you out, e.g. Google’s Files app and Google Photos automatically suggest which files can be deleted or archived. But even then it’s a hassle and apps grow in size over time, which you can’t do much about besides deleting an app or two.

Google's Files app has automatic tools to help you remove old, unwanted files

The importance of microSD slots has waned. A year ago more than 50% of people thought that a memory card slot is vital. Now that that number has fallen to 40%. It seems that the slot is transitioning into “nice to have” territory.

That’s probably for the better as most manufacturers omit a microSD slot on the new phones, (in fact it has been the norm for high end offerings for a while). And even when it is available, it is often in the form of a hybrid slot, i.e. you have to decide between expanding the storage or having a second SIM card.

A second SIM slot means you can get cheap data, especially when traveling. And to some that is more important than having extra memory on their phone.