How to record screen Android 4.3 and old cell phones

September 19, 2020, by Santiago Comment

Recording the screen of an Android (recording a video of what happens on the screen) is somewhat complicated on old devices or cell phones, since most of the applications available on Google Play for this task do not comply with what they offer in their entirety. After trying several of them without success on my cell phone, I found one that finally offers the functionalities I need, totally free.

This is Z-Screen Recorder (Z-ScreenRecorder). You may download the Google Play app here and if you have access root On your mobile, you can use it without problems since it is in Spanish and it is very easy to use. Being root is a fundamental requirement. If you don’t know what it is, you won’t be able to use this app. Check out our Root section for more information.

Clarification: Z Screen Recorder has a low average rating and reputation on Google Play. You do not always have to get carried away with this, because many of the users who download the application do not even know what it is to be root. This is the reason why it does not work for them at all on their phone and they end up giving a bad rating and destroying the reputation of an application like this that, from my experience, is very good. Speaking of experience, I have tried it in a Samsung Galaxy S3 mini (rooted) with Android 4.1, with excellent results. This is the summary of the application:

The good

The bad

• It does not have settings that, for example, allow modifying the video quality
• Record without audio
• Does not capture and display in the video the user’s touches or clicks on the screen
• Unprofessional design
• Use Google Analytics to collect user information (without specifying exactly what information)
• Requires Root (like most really functional screen recorder apps)

How to use Z-ScreenRecorder

Just download and install the application. You must grant it root permissions. Clever. To start recording, press the big “Record” button. You will see that, when it is recording, a button will appear that flashes in red and gray in the notification bar.

To stop recording, display the Android status bar (that bar that you display to see the notifications) and click on the Z-ScreenRecorder notification. It appears that the recording can also be stopped by opening the application again while it is recording.

The large Gallery button allows you to view the videos you have recorded from the same application. From there you can also send or share the videos individually, as well as delete them.

Where are the videos saved?

You will find the videos you recorded in the internal memory, in the folder «zausan«. Inside is the Z-ScreenRecorder folder where you will find all the recorded videos. Videos are saved in MP4 format.

Conclution

As I already indicated, this screen recording is quite complicated on cell phones with Android Jelly Bean or 4.3 and lower. Most of the apps that exist for these versions of the system, or perhaps all of them, work on some mobiles, on others half and on others not at all. Beyond what was said at the beginning, Z-Screen Recorder can also be one of them, so I cannot guarantee that it will work on your mobile. If it works for you, then congratulations because it is one of the best free alternatives that are on Google Play. What is good for free is difficult or impossible to find in another free application of this type (generally, in other applications you have to pay to have these advantages). What’s wrong is that most similar apps suffer from that.

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