WatchDog what it is and detect CPU usage of apps on Android. APK

June 2, 2014, by Santiago Comment

Do you know what happens when you are using an application and you press the home button on your phone to exit it? It is “minimized” and works silently (in the “background”). In that state, even if you don’t see it, said application will be using your Android’s CPU or processor (the main electronic chip in charge of executing all the tasks ordered by the user on the device).

This is how Android apps normally work but, there may be times when apps abuse CPU usage. As the ideal is that this chip is not working to the limit (to avoid the mobile device from slowing down and also to avoid wasting valuable battery) applications that consume too much CPU are not good in this regard.

Now, how to know which applications are the ones that use more CPU or processor on my Android, you may wonder … Well, we have been talking about WLD for a long time, an excellent application that I recommend you to know this and other important information about how the applications are behaving in your Android. You can also alternatively use Watchdog Task Manager Lite.

Don’t be fooled by its somewhat “ugly” name: it is a very simple application to use to monitor your Android CPU and find out which applications are consuming the resources of this chip the most. You just have to install it and open it once to configure the monitoring profile (Moderate is the most recommended profile to start with). There is not much to do after that: when an application is abusing its CPU usage, Watchdog will generate an alert in the form of a notification to let you know.

Monitoring is done both for applications that are in the background and for those that are in the foreground (with which the user is currently interacting).

How WatchDog Works

When you open Watchdog to see details of the monitoring of the applications, you will find an interface in Spanish. Basically this is what you have there:

You have three tabs in Watchdog. The first, as you can see, gives general details of the operation of the CPU. The second tab shows a history of the alerts (list with all the alerts that were generated since this monitor was installed) and the last tab, which serves to see the applications that are running in the background at that moment and how much CPU is consuming each one (in percentage. Less is better).

In that last tab, you can click on each application and “Finish” or close it in case it is behaving abusively. You can also open the application from there. For advanced users there is the possibility of putting applications on a White List, to prevent Watchdog from generating alerts when these apps are exceeding normal CPU usage.

On this screen you also have the option to activate the Real Time CPU box, which is used to know the precise data of how much CPU the applications are consuming at that exact moment, and the option to Pause to stop monitoring.

Conclution

With Watchdog you can practically know which applications are slowing down your Android. Of course, higher CPU usage implies higher battery usage, so with this tool you can also know directly which applications use the most battery, just like WLD.

Watchdog Task Manager Lite is free and does not require any permission on your Android to work, which guarantees that it will not do anything on your phone other than inform you of what is indicated here. The PRO version available for $ 3.49 has the same functions as the Lite version, but additionally is ad-free and allows you to create a Black List of applications, which can be assigned a CPU usage limit percentage. When they exceed that limit, they will be closed automatically.

Descargar WatchDog Task Manager Lite: APKPure

Wakelock Detector alerts you which APPS activate the screen, CPU and consume battery

The screen is running out of your cell phone’s battery, but there is a solution

How WiFi influences battery consumption and how to control it