A manager reviews device performance on his Zebra VisibilityIQ dashboard
By Sharon Lee | January 24, 2024

Curious How Much Memory is Left on Your Zebra Android Devices? Want to Know Which Apps (or Devices) are Using the Most Cellular Data?

Make sure you’ve set up the automated reports available to you in VisibilityIQ Foresight for both key performance indicators.

A few months ago, Bruce Willins explained why it’s so important to select mobile devices that have the right amount of RAM for their intended use cases. He also walked you through the math that will help you make the right choice. 

But since then, a few people have asked if there’s a way to either passively or actively monitor the amount of RAM left on Zebra Android mobile devices already in the field. So, I want to make sure you know about the Memory (RAM) Utilization report you can set up in VisibilityIQ right now.

This report uses an algorithm to aggregate the last 90 days of memory (RAM) usage activity so you can quickly see which applications have high memory utilization rates based on actual past behavior (as opposed to set thresholds). It even breaks down the RAM consumption data into three categories: top business applications, top non-business applications, and top utility applications. This enables you to instantly pinpoint apps that could be causing device performance issues that lead to worker or workflow inefficiencies. Once you know the source of the problem, it’s usually easy to figure out the fix and restore device performance. 

A screenshot of the Zebra VisibilityIQ Foresight Memory (RAM) Utilization Report

While you’re in your VisibilityIQ dashboard, I also recommend you set up the WWAN (Cellular) Utilization report that is now available.

This report aggregates the last 90 days of WWAN usage activity to provide insight into high cellular data utilization. It will show you total device data usage along with the following:

  • High Cellular Data Usage by Applications – data is broken down by top business apps and non-business apps

  • High Cellular Data Usage by Devices – reveals the top devices sorted by highest data usage

  • High Cellular Data Usage by Sites– reveals the top sites sorted by highest data usage

A screenshot of the Zebra VisibilityIQ Foresight WWAN Utilization Report

It will be clear whose data usage is high or low and if there are any opportunities to reduce usage. When you couple the data from this report with the RAM report insights, it will be easy to identify if employees have personal apps that are consuming data and get those removed. It will also make it easy to see if a newly updated application is consuming more data than pre-upgrade, in which case you may want to consider rolling back or making changes to the next version of the app if either RAM or WWAN usage is a concern. 

Remember, these two reports are included with your VisibilityIQ Foresight subscription. It won’t cost you anything more to gain this additional clarity on device performance. So, I encourage you to go into your dashboard now and set up the reports. You can request assistance with set up by emailing our team here: mscustomeronboarding@zebra.com.

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Sharon Lee
Sharon Lee

Sharon Lee is the Global Portfolio Manager of VisibilityIQ Foresight at Zebra Technologies. She has vast experience in product management across several B2B and B2B2C industries. She believes that delighting the customer is the key to product success and adoption. While not creating products that customers love, she can be found upside down at yoga studios. Her favorite yoga pose is the headstand – literally seeing the world with a different view.