Utilities are great, That’s why our house is full of them. But sometimes things don’t go as planned, and it’s not fun to waste time by fixing problems. But turning everything off and on—a common practice among IT departments—can alleviate a host of problems. If you automate or schedule regular reboots, you can even prevent problems from arising and give your devices the best chance of running smoothly.
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Smartphones and Tablets
Now, both Android and iOS are resource efficient, which means there’s no need to restart your phone to clear RAM or app cache. But our loyal mobile devices are still handheld computers. They work 24/7 and can be prone to performance slowdowns, connection problems and other glitches if we never restart them.
If you have specific issues, such as lag, restarting is the first troubleshooting step that Google recommends. It’s not necessary to reboot if your phone is running fine, but we recommend restarting it once a week if you experience frequent glitches or lags.
How to restart Android phones and tablets
To manually restart your Android phone, hold down the Power button until the power menu pops up and press Restart. If your power menu doesn’t appear for some reason, holding down the power button continuously for 30 seconds or so will turn off the phone and you can press it again to turn it back on.
Some Android phone also provides option to schedule automatic reboot. For example, if you have a Samsung Galaxy phone, go to Setting and find Auto-reboot at set times. It is also accessible in Setting, afterward Battery and device care, by tapping the three dots and selecting Automation. This feature allows you to choose a date and time to restart automatically every so often.
Just remember: When you restart your phone, you’ll have to enter your PIN when it restarts (even if you’ve set up biometrics, such as a fingerprint). Restarting will consume more battery than usual as apps and processes will restart continuously.
How to Restart iPhone and iPad
To restart your iPhone, hold down the Power button and the volume button until Slide to power off pops up (if you have an iPhone with Touch ID or a Home button, just hold down the Power button). Press the Power button again to turn the device back on. If the power off slider does not appear for some reason, try Force Restart.
Desktops and laptops
We recommend making a full backup and reset your computer once a year to declutter and keep things running smoothly, but you should also reboot often. Your computer will prompt you to restart when needed, such as after installing new software, but you should also set up frequent restarts.
If you completely shut down your desktop or laptop every night, there’s no need to worry, as you’re effectively restarting it on a daily basis. Always save any open work and exit the application before you restart it.
Windows PC
When I asked Microsoft how often to restart a Windows machine, Microsoft introduced me to this advice. It officially suggests that you should restart your Windows PC at least once a week.
