Hold the power button and the volume down button simultaneously until you get the Android bootloader menu.The most common scenario for using this option is a bricked device, something went awfully wrong, and there's no way of getting Android to boot. Do note memory cards inserted will be left untouched.įinally, there is the hard reset. Once you take the plunge, your phone will be wiped from any personal data and clean boot exactly how it was when it came out of the box. Go to Settings, choose Backup & Reset and the select 'Factory Data Reset.' You will be prompted to confirm.

If you need to reset your Android device to its factory state (a common reason is if you're selling and moving to a new phone), there are two ways to perform a reset.Īndroid offers a built-in soft reset option, readily available from your phone's settings menu. Some other devices, like most Motorola phones are slightly different, the procedure is the same but instead of using the volume down button you use the volume up button. This should work for any stock Android device like Google Nexus and Google Pixel, Samsung Galaxy, and LG phones.

In most Android devices, you have to simultaneously press the power and volume down buttons for 5 seconds. Depending on your device, this can be achieved by pressing a combination of buttons. You can go for what is known as a 'hard' reboot. This is also known as a 'soft' restart.īut what if you device freezes, goes blank, or becomes unresponsive and you can't get to that menu. If you experience one of those symptoms all you need to reboot is press the power button and choose restart. Rebooting or restarting is the way to go if your phone or tablet starts acting funny, or maybe showing a bit of sluggishness. Although the terms may seem similar they are quite different. Resetting, on the other hand, means taking the device back to the state in which it left the factory. The purpose is to close and reopen the operating system. Rebooting is the same as restarting, and close enough to powering off and then turning off your device. To kick things off I think it is best to explain the difference rebooting and resetting. Sometimes things go wrong and knowing how to hard reboot or reset your Android device can come handy.

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