Google stops giving away cloud space, your smartphone backup now counts toward the total

Until now, Android users have enjoyed a degree of flexibility when it comes to saving data from their devices. Full backups of smartphones did not significantly affect the Google account storage quota, except for large multimedia content such as images uploaded to Google Photos, videos, and MMS messages.

Starting today, the Mountain View company has decided to modify this setting, including every single piece of information saved within the available space count, which begins at the classic 15 GB of the free plan to reach the higher thresholds provided by the Google One subscription.

Smartphone backup now counts toward Google Cloud storage space

This means that items previously excluded from the calculation, such as the full texts of SMS messages, call history and the phone’s system preferences, will start occupying a fraction of cloud space.

The decision aligns device backups with the stricter rules already in force for legacy services such as Gmail and Google Drive.

Although the novelty may raise some concerns among those whose account storage is almost full, estimates provided by the company reassure about the actual scope of the update. On average, the new information archived will require only 40 MB of additional space per user.

This is a fairly small amount, often less than the weight of a small group of high-resolution photos, and is unlikely to exhaust personal storage.

Greater autonomy and data management

In conjunction with the policy update, the company has introduced a series of tools designed to put decision-making power back into the hands of consumers. The operating system now includes specific toggles to finely manage the upload of individual file categories.

It thus becomes possible to turn on or off at will the backup for individual SMS messages, MMS contents, call history, and basic device settings.

Those who do not consider restoring the old call log on the next smartphone essential can simply exclude it from the operation, keeping their digital archive clean.

On Pixel devices, accessing these options requires a quick navigation through the general settings, via the account and backup section, tapping the Google entry and finally selecting the data from other devices. Alternatively, it is always effective to search for the correct term in the dedicated search field.

Rollout timeline

The rollout follows a phased approach. The updated calculation takes effect immediately for those who configure the service for the first time starting from July 7, while for historic and already active accounts the transition will occur progressively over the coming months.

Several smartphones are already displaying the new commands, signaling a gradual release that is expanding globally.

This choice ensures everyone has enough time to familiarize themselves with the updated commands, ensuring full transparency about which information is actually transferred to the central servers.