Comparison
Files by Google alternatives
Files by Google is the rare free app with no ads and no upsell, and it does three things well: junk file cleanup, WhatsApp media management, and browsing your largest files.
That makes "alternative" a narrow question. In most cases the right answer is keep using Files by Google. Here are the three situations where something else genuinely beats it.
1. Your problem is photos, not files
Files by Google detects duplicates at the file level — byte-identical copies. That catches "you downloaded the same image twice", and misses the things that actually bloat a camera roll:
- Bursts — 8 near-identical frames of the same second; nothing is a duplicate
- Near-duplicates — the same photo saved, resized, re-exported, or sent through a chat app
- Visually similar — "one more just in case" shots
Finding those needs pixel comparison, which is a different kind of tool. Our Photo Cleaner does that on-device, groups the results, and shows you each group before anything is deleted.
On a 20,000-photo library, that's typically 3–8 GB — much more than the junk-file cleanup will find.
2. You want compression instead of deletion
Files by Google can delete; it can't shrink. Sometimes the right answer to "I want to keep this photo but not at 12 MB" is compression — a 12 MB photo is often 3 MB with no visible difference at 100% zoom.
Google Photos does offer compression (storage saver), but it replaces your copy with a cloud-backed version. Our Cleaner compresses locally and shows a before/after at 100% crop so you're choosing with your eyes.
3. You want to know what a clean actually touched
Files by Google's cleanup is aggregate: "we freed 1.2 GB". That's fine for junk, and not fine for photos — because photos are the one category where a wrong deletion is unrecoverable in an emotional sense, even if it's technically in the trash.
Our flow is deliberately slower: group, review, swipe, undo, confirm. Slower is the feature here.
Side by side
| Tool | Junk / cache | WhatsApp media | Exact duplicates | Near-duplicates & bursts | Compression |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Files by Google | Yes | Yes | Yes (file-level) | No | No |
| Keep Photo: Photo Cleaner | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| SD Maid SE | Yes, deeper | Partly | No | No | No |
| Google Photos | No | No | No | Screenshots/blurry only | Yes (cloud-backed) |
What each is actually for
- Files by Google → "I need 500 MB back today, and I want to see what's junk." Keep it installed.
- SD Maid SE → "My phone is full and I have no idea why." System-level tool.
- Our Cleaner → "Most of my storage is photos, and I don't want to delete the wrong ones."
- Google Photos → "I already live in Google's ecosystem and I'm fine with that."
They're not substitutes; the sensible setup is Files by Google for junk plus one photo tool for the camera roll.
The test that saves you a download
Before installing anything, do this: Settings → Storage, tap Images & Videos, look at the size. Then compare it with the Apps number.
- If images are 50%+ of your used space, a photo dedupe pass is your highest-yield move — start there.
- If they're small and Apps/Other are huge, a photo tool won't help you and Files by Google (or uninstalling) will.
That 20-second check is more valuable than any app comparison, including this one.