Each Android user has probably experienced the Google Play Store suddenly crashing and burning. Whether you get an error message when downloading apps or the Play Store just doesn’t work when you launch, it’s all just really annoying. Here are some tips that will get the Google Play Store working on your phone, guaranteed. [Update: we've been hearing that users are having problems with the Google Play Store or WhatsApp not working. There has recently been a WhatsApp update forced upon us, so check point one in our article for a possible solution.]
1. Empty the cache
In most cases, you just need to empty the cache of the Play Store app. This is a storage area that will temporarily hold data which can then quickly be retrieved again without needing to be reloaded, meaning a page will load quicker. In order to empty this, you just need to open the settings and find the Apps section. Now choose ‘All’ and find the Google Play Store. Tap on it and press on the ‘Empty Cache’ button. Now when you open Google Play, it should run as before.
Update: On August 4th 2014 many users were forced to update WhatsApp and encountered issues in the Google Play Store. If you were one of those people, apply the same process to empty the Google Play cache (as above) but do it for WhatsApp instead. This should fix the problem for 99% of users, but if not, try some of the other tips below.
If the first tip didn’t work, then you can try deleting the data from the Play Store. This pretty much sets the app back to square one and gets rid of a lot of saved information. The option is again found by following the same route as above, but this time you tap on ‘Delete Data’.
3. Uninstall Play Store updates
Even this can help. Sometimes an update will get Google Play all out of whack, so it makes sense to uninstall an update, which you do by going into the settings, search for Google Play Store and press the button that says ‘Uninstall Updates’. This will revert Google Play back to the original version as it appeared when it was first installed on your device.
If you have deactivated the Download Manager, Google Play won’t work anymore. To get it back, go to Settings, then App Manager (or equivalent) and all apps. Search for Download Manager and tap on the activate button. However, if this button says deactivate, no worries, this means that the Download Manager is already active.
7. Perform a Factory Data Reset of your smartphone
If you’ve done everything written above and still to no avail, then you might need to resort to the ultimate step of performing a Factory Data Reset of your phone. This could be your only way out of Google Play misery. However, be forewarned that all of your data will be lost, so it is super important to perform a complete backup beforehand. To perform a Factory Data Reset you go to your Settings once again, then ‘Backup and Reset’ and select ‘Factory Data Reset’ at the bottom of the list. Your smartphone will start anew and revert back to how it was when you first got it. Once the process is complete, you can set it up again as before and restore the backup.
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