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Due to unfortunate circumstances I need to use my old phone again (Huawei P8 Lite 2017 Emui 5.0.1). I did a factory reset a few days ago, and am now trying to install my most important apps.

Unfortunately I keep running into space constraints. It seems there is a 2.4GB file downloaded for a system update, but even before installing any apps my phone did not have enough free space to execute it.

I am willing to accept being stuck on a lower version till I switch my phone, but I need to remove the huge file as the 2.4GB is blocking me from installing critical apps.

I have already blocked new updates from being downloaded automatically, but am now stuck with the one that is already there.

So hence my question:

How can I remove the downloaded system update from my Huawei phone?

What I tried so far: - Install a file browser and look for an OTA dir, I don't seem to have access to that - Go to the update and storage cleaning apps, but I did not see any way to clear this download

I imagine I could do a factory reset and block automatic downloads before connecting to wifi, but as I just installed and configured 80% of my apps, I really don't want to do that.

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    Check if you have dload folder. The update files might be there. Aug 31, 2019 at 9:50
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    You can try to apply the update using a PC and the Software provided by Samsung. I am not sure how much free space is necessary for install an update via PC. The is a similar question with is a bit old by may still be helpful: android.stackexchange.com/questions/32205
    – Robert
    Aug 31, 2019 at 13:42

3 Answers 3

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It happened the same to me in a Huawei Honor view 20. I managed do delete the file. What happens is that the system creates a ghost file to lock the required space for the update (in my case it was 4.27gb) before the update is actually downloaded. As a previous comment says, I went to settings > apps and Clear Data for the Software Update app, but the 4.27gb were still being used even after confirming the delete option there. What I did was disabling the auto download for system updates over wifi and actually accepting the download and installation in system > software update. When the download just starts, pause it. In this way the size of the update file will be actual downloaded size, which was interrupted and it's not going to be resumed. In my case I passed from a 4.27gb file to a 71mb file.

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    Wow, quite an impressive journey. Cannot test anymore but will accept as this sounds likely to help future visitors! Sep 18, 2020 at 12:21
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Go to settings > apps and Clear Data for the Software Update app. Seems to work as the app takes up 3GB with an update downloaded.

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I found that the update was actually not (fully?) downloaded on my phone yet.

Perhaps this contributes to not finding a way to delete it, though I doubt that.

The way you can validate this is by turning on the airplane mode and going to the upgrade. If you are in my situation, you should get an error message about downloading.


This still leaves the mystery of why my 16GB phone with 6GB firmware and 1~2GB apps, content, cache etc. Complains about being 90% full, but that may be a separate question.

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