How To Fix Slow Or Unresponsive Samsung Galaxy Touchscreen

If you noticed that your Samsung Galaxy phone or tablet appears to have slow or unresponsive touchscreen lately, it may be due to a number of different factors. Older devices tend to slow down compared to new ones but if your device is relatively new, you’ll have to figure out the cause of the problem.

This guide will help you determine what’s the reason for your unresponsive touchscreen. Check out our solutions below to see what you need to do.

Troubleshooting a slow or unresponsive Samsung Galaxy touchscreen

Estimate Cost : 0

Time Needed : 7 minutes

It’s often not straightforward in fixing an issue like a slow touchscreen but there are a number of things that you can do to narrow possible factors down. Learn what you need to do below.

  1. Check for screen damage.

    broken screen

    Having hardware damage to the screen of your Samsung Galaxy phone or tablet can obviously lead to problems, one of them being a slow or unresponsive touchscreen. The screen on your device have two functions: one is to act as monitor that displays images and the other is to receive inputs (touches or taps) to navigate the software.

    Any break in the integrity of the physical screen can seriously hamper these functions and cause errors. The more errors occur as you operate the device, the slower or glitchy the device may become.

    Eventually, the system may become overloaded with errors that it may not be able to handle them. This can lead to crashes, slow response time, or other signs of performance problems.

    If you dropped the phone or tablet, or if it’s hit by something hard and the screen has damage, you should consider having the device checked by a professional. The issue you’re having is most likely due to the hardware damage the device has sustained.

  2. Remove screen protector.

    Note10 screen protector

    Some third party screen protectors may not work well with some Samsung devices. If there’s no obvious hardware damage to the phone, try removing the screen protector to see if that will improve things. Some thick screen protectors may lessen the sensitivity of the touchscreen.

    If you’re using a Samsung screen protector, or if you did not remove the thin plastic screen cover, try cleaning the screen with a soft cloth.

  3. Reboot the system.

    reboot 8

    A simple restart can sometimes do wonders. Make sure that you turn the device on and off and see if that will help. Minor bugs are sometimes fixed by refreshing a computer or smartphone so you don’t want to skip this.

  4. Close apps running in the background.

    Optimize now 1

    Your Samsung’s touchscreen may be slow or unresponsive because the system is overwhelmed by many apps running in the background. On paper, Android is supposed to manage RAM without user intervention by closing some apps running in the background to give way to a new one. However, this scheme is not always implemented in real life causing slow performance. 

    To fix an issue stemming from possible RAM mismanagement, you can try to optimize your device regularly. This simple procedure can be performed in under 1 minute so we highly recommend that you do it at least once a week. To do this, just head over to Settings > Device Care > Optimize now.

  5. Refresh the system cache.

    cache partition 7 scaled

    One other possible reason why your device appear slow or not as responsive as you expect is due to a corrupted system cache. This can sometimes occur after a software update. To ensure that the system cache is up-to-date, you can wipe the cache partition

    Android uses the system cache to load apps quickly. This is done by compiling often-referenced files like photos, videos, links, or other sets of files in the cache partition instead of downloading them from the internet every time the system needs them. Having these files stored locally is way faster than downloading them.

    The cache partition is a portion in the internal storage that stores the Operating System (OS) updates, and system cache so clearing it won’t affect any of your personal data. You can wipe the cache partition safely anytime. 

  6. Wipe device with factory reset.

    Delete all 7

    Most cases of slow or unresponsive touchscreen issues are due to a software-related glitch. If none of the solutions above helped to fix your problem, you can reset the software back to factory defaults. While this is often effective, it can also be tedious to do as it will delete your personal data as well as all customizations you’ve done on your device. 

    Be sure to create a backup of your data using Smart SwitchSamsung Cloud, or Google Cloud. After a factory reset, you can then restore some of your customizations, apps, and files depending on the option you picked.

  7. Have your phone repaired.

    galaxy a73 touchscreen unresponsive 3

    If your Samsung Galaxy touchscreen is still slow after doing all the solutions above, there may be a deeper reason for it that a factory reset can’t address. You must get help from Samsung in this case.

    Visit your local Samsung store or Service Center so the device can be examined.

Tools
  • touchscreen
Materials
  • Samsung Galaxy

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Get help from us

Having Issues with your phone? Feel free to contact us using this form. We’ll try to help. We also create videos for those wanting to follow visual instructions. Visit our TheDroidGuy Youtube Channel for troubleshooting.

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George Tsay

Executive editor in charge of The Droid Guy since 2012. Coordinates a group of more than 10 editors and writers based around the world as they cover the latest and greatest products in consumer technology. Grew up and lives in Southern California. Go Bruins. Go Padres. Go Chargers. Find me on Twitter

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