Fortunately, it won’t consume too much additional space.
A significant update regarding Google account storage will be implemented this week. Starting on July 7, all data associated with Android backups will count toward the storage limit of your Google account. Previously, only media stored in Google Photos or MMS data was considered in this limit. New Android users will experience this change immediately, while existing users can expect the rollout to occur over the following months.
According to a company spokesperson, “Android backup allows users to save their phone’s data to their Google Account, making it easy to restore or set up a new device. Our updated policy now counts all Android backup data towards Google Account storage, which we anticipate will only add approximately 40MB on average. Additionally, we’re introducing more transparency and new controls for users to select which data and apps to back up.”
Users can find these new controls in the backup menu of their devices, where they can choose to exclude settings, call history, or SMS/MMS messages from backups, along with options for individual app data.
This update is part of a broader shift in Google’s storage policies. Earlier in May, the company began testing a reduced free storage limit for new accounts, lowering the maximum from 15GB to 5GB unless the user linked their phone number.
