Digital Wellbeing app causes performance issues for Android devices

by ddos · May 13, 2019

Digital Wellbeing is the idea that by quantifying and informing people of how long they’re spending with technology, they can potentially reduce the problems caused by heavy use. Digital Wellbeing app reduces notifications, stop unnecessary interactions, limit visual disturbances and make it easier to get the information you need in a shorter amount of time. However, in the past week, many Pixel users have reported that this app has performance issues. There are many reports on the performance improvement in the Reddit community after closing the Digital Wellbeing app.

In the popular discussion in the Reddit community, a user explains:

Saw it was a known bug on some YouTube comment about the Pixel 3a, turned it off on my Pixel 3 and it has made the world of difference.

Can’t believe I was living with so much stuttering thinking it was normal. The difference is like night and day.

If you have a Pixel 3, I highly recommend you give it a go even if you think you have no performance issues.

As noted by user Trueray17, disabling Digital Wellbeing dramatically improves performance on the Pixel 3 and 3 XL:

So, I have literally spent months trying different methods in attempts of fixing the Pixel 3 sluggishness and stuttering issues. I tried reboots, uninstalling unwanted apps, clearing the cache, full system wipes, etc but no matter what the performance issues would return. A few days ago I stared at my pixel 3 just confused why is performance so terrible, I personally don’t believe it’s the lack of ram but software related. I asked myself what is the last big feature that Google added to Android Pie?! Just maybe that is the culprit.

Then, Digital Wellbeing came in to mind. So I went in to my settings clicked on Digital Wellbeing, clicked the 3 dots on the top right and turned off usage access. Disabling digital Wellbeing from tracking apps and data. After that, my phone has been butter smooth not one stutter or lag. Switching between apps is a breeze now, no more text input lag just speedy performance throughout the whole UI.

Also, if you reduce animations in developer options it’s a whole new experience (blazing fast). I highly recommend everyone who is experiencing performance issues (sluggishness, lag, stutters) throughout the UI to disable digital Wellbeing. Let us know if it fixed the performance issues and spread the word.

If you have performance issues, you should disable Digital Wellbeing. Below how to disable Digital Wellbeing