One of the big reasons we root phones is to get rid of bloatware and gain some control over how our phones operate. Unfortunately, after rooting we often discover that programs that we need are actually the causes of some of the slowdowns we rooted to get rid of in the first place. Greenify for root users lets you select and hibernate processes so they don’t consume CPU when you’re not using them.
Unlike Titanium Backup’s freeze feature, which freezes an app and essentially blocks it from running, Greenifying an app allows it to run and function normally while it’s being used but does not allow it to consume resources while it’s hanging around in the background.
And unlike most task killers out there, you’re not engaged in a constant battle of killing a process only to have it respawn from the dead, consuming CPU and battery to load, only to be killed again at a later time.
Greenify is pretty new to the world, so there are bound to be some interesting bugs forthcoming, but from what I’ve found it functions and does what it says. I’m fairly early into a new ROM, so I don’t have the slowdown that’s generally associated with ROMs after you use them for a while, so I can’t tell much other than that background processes that were running before now aren’t consuming any more CPU time.
Some things to note when using Greenify: If you Greenify a background alarm, it won’t trigger. If you Greenify a social media app, it won’t notify you when you’re mentioned or receive a push message, and if you tag a widget, it’ll show but never update due to widgets using background processes to update the foreground image. So don’t Greenify those.
Greenify also contains a neat little screen that shows you what is taking resources, and what potentially can cause your device to slow down in certain situations. It’s extremely useful for figuring out why you have long delays when switching power sources or network connectivity.
Download: Google Play
I downloaded this app, but ended up not greenifying anything because I found out I rely too much on those background processes for notifications, etc… a lot of people in the comments on the Play Store said they greenified Google Maps, but I didn’t want to do that either, as I think that’s what Google Now relies on for much of its functionality…
I ended up greenifying the Amazon Appstore, which evidently sits there doing something in the background a lot according to Greenify, Words with Friends as most of the day I don’t have time to play (I ungreenify it at night) and Zombie Farm, which as far as I can tell has no reason to be running, use CPU, etc as the only thing I get from it is memory hogging and random notes that it’s time to buy something or farm something.
Also greenified Facebook as during the day I’m in front of a computer, during the night I’m near a computer, and when I’m out I probably am not wanting to get spammed with facebook chat. I do, however like the ability to pop it open and see what is going on if I’m sitting and bored.
It’s a pretty useful little app.
When I tried to greenify facebook I get “Ingreenifiable. Sorry, system app is impossible to be greenified.”
make it not a system app then. Pretty sure Titanium Backup has the option, or if you want just move it from /system/app to wherever your ROM stores non-system apps… .android_secure I guess
I think the background Google Maps processes are mostly for caching maps when you’re on Wi-Fi. Thankfully they only take up a few MB of RAM and probably very few CPU cycles.
I think I like Paul’s idea of greenifying Amazon Appstore. That’s one that app that always sits cached in my RAM, when I only rarely open it to update an app or try a new one that I happened to notice is free.
So I have a freshly rooted/rom’d Evo3d and I can’t get this to install. Play store says incompatible; found apk gives a parsing error. Anyone else having this happen?
This app seems like a must have