From time to time it may be necessary to reset the phone, to return it to its initial state as when it left the factory. The reasons may be the need to format the phone and delete all the data before selling or lending the phone to someone, or to solve some configuration problem that causes malfunctions on the system or on some applications.
With an Android phone, whatever brand or model it is and any version of Android, it's pretty easy to format (this word is used improperly here, but it makes the idea), reset the phone from scratch, delete everything and reset the system .
The factory reset is in fact a button in the Settings menu and, even if you have to be careful of a couple of things, it is a rather quick operation, which has no contraindications, if not the fact that any saved data is removed from memory.
As said, to reset the Android phone, just go to Settings .
On most newer phones, you can do this by dragging the notification bar down and then pressing the small gear icon in the upper right corner.
Android settings can also be opened from the list of applications.
In the Settings menu, scroll to the " Backup and reset " option, tap on it and then go to " Factory data reset ".
The names of these menus can also change depending on the brand of the Android smartphone and the installed version.
As you can read on the confirmation screen, with the factory reset all the data is deleted, including the apps, accounts, photos.
Obviously the Android system remains installed and all settings are reset (the memory is therefore not formatted).
It is understood that things like the address book, if data backup for the Google account is active, it remains saved online and is restored on the mobile phone if you log in again with the same account (see also how to recover the address book on Android).
The installed apps can be found and re-downloaded from the Play Store, by going to the "my apps" section.
Instead, the photos and videos will be visible on the phone again if automatic backup with Google Photos was activated.
Even the documents, if they were saved on Google Drive, can be recovered.
Whatsapp messages will be automatically recovered from Google Drive and even those of Facebook will not be lost.
In practice, thanks to the magic of the "cloud" apps, resetting becomes a quick way to solve any problem and clean up the phone with the certainty of being able to restore personal data as you would on a new phone.
Then touch the Reset phone button and enter the PIN or the sequence to confirm the operation (this prevents another person from resetting our phone perhaps as a joke).
After entering the PIN or password, there will be yet another warning that the data will be deleted and another button with " Reset " written to be pressed to delete everything.
The phone is immediately restarted, all settings return to their default value, all data removed and Android will have the appearance it had when the cell phone was bought, requesting to log in with a Google account and to proceed with the initial configuration of Android .
Important NOTE : With the reset procedure of the Android phone all data is erased, except for the data on the SD card which is not touched.
So if you are selling your phone, remember to remove the SD card or erase its memory using an app like ES File Manager.
i recommend removing the SD card completely or formatting on the PC first.
Important NOTE 2 : As written in another article, if you have to sell or give the phone to another person, you should be careful and proceed with the factory reset only after proceeding with the secure erasure of the memory on Android.
Finally, in case the phone no longer turns on, see here how to restore Android even if the phone does not start or seems dead
