Smartphones are pretty much ubiquitous these days. What used to be a young person’s technology, is now being used by old and young alike. A lot of people tend to store a heck of a lot of stuff on their phone, be it photos, emails, contacts or music – the list goes on. As with other kinds of technology, things to break now and again, not to mention getting lost.

How upset would you be if you had, for example, hundreds of photos stored on your phone and then dropped it down the toilet, or it was stolen, or left in a café never to be seen again, and you had no copy of your treasured memories? How much less upset would you be if you knew the photos on that phone were backed up somewhere?

Backing up isn’t just about protecting your personal memories, family phone numbers, or the videos of your dog wearing sunglasses, it’s also about convenience. It means that if and when you replace your phone, you can have it set up and looking like your old one, in just a short space of time.

How To Backup Up With Android

If you’re using a Android phone, then it probably means you’ve embraced the Google ecosystem. Hopefully it also means you have a Google account (which automatically comes with a handy 15Gb of storage space). Once you’re signed into the Google account on the phone, the process is nice and straight forward.

Firstly, you’ll want to go to your apps and then open Settings. Then, look for Personal, then Backup and Reset. Simply tap Backup My Data and turn it on.

Then you’ll be asked to select an account. From here select the Google account and tap on the email address you’re using. Now you should be able to see options for each type of data (contacts, photos etc.) you can back up.

Best of all, if you ever have to use another Android phone, just sign into the same Google account during setup, and your backed-up data will be there.

How To Backup An iPhone

If you’re using an iPhone, the centre of all your backup universe is known as iCloud. To use iCloud, users must have an iTunes account – it’s free to sign up for and you can find out how to set up an account here. With iCloud you are automatically given 5Gb of storage space for all your photos, contacts etc.

Always make sure you are connected to your Wifi when doing any sort of backing up.

So, to access iCloud, navigate to Settings and tap on your name at the top of the Settings page. Then select iCloud. First, and most importantly, you’ll want to scroll to the bottom of the list where you’ll find an entry for iCloud backup, which you can turn on or off. Make sure it’s on.

Now you should see a bar indicator showing you how much space you have available, and what kind of data you already have backed up. Under the chart, there is a list of apps using iCloud for storing data, and you can toggle these on or off.

In a similar way to Android, once you’ve set up iCloud, you can be confident in the fact, that if you want to change phones, or if you buy a new iPhone, you just sign into your iCloud account and all your data will be there.

If you need help backing up your smartphone, get in touch with us today and see how we can help.