Android: How to get storage of external sd-card?

Question

In my device I have 32GB internal memory and 64GB on SD-Card. I like to get the external free size with this method (based on this thread Android get free size of internal/external memory):

public static long getAvailableExternalMemorySize() {
    if (externalMemoryAvailable()) {
        File path = Environment.getExternalStorageDirectory();
        StatFs stat = new StatFs(path.getPath());
        long blockSize = stat.getBlockSize();
        long availableBlocks = stat.getAvailableBlocks();
        return availableBlocks * blockSize;

    } else {
        return 0;
    }
}

When I run this code it only shows me the free storage of internal memory. Why does it not shows the external SD-Card size? On Device Storage I have 11GB free and on external SD-Card there are 40GB free.

"Why does it not shows the external SD-Card size?" -- because the Android SDK does not support [arbitrary access to removable storage](https://commonsware.com/blog/2014/04/09/storage-situation-removable-storage.html). — CommonsWare, Apr 27 '15 at 13:07
You could try to request your app to be installed to the external storage, so when storing your files they can be stored to sd card. See: http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/data/install-location.html — marius bardan, Apr 27 '15 at 13:25
So I can't get the storage size of external SD-Card? How is the Settings -> Storage on Android working if there is no way to read the storage? — MSeiz5, Apr 27 '15 at 13:30

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Apr 27 '15 at 12:52

Problem is that there is no api to access external sd cards on android. On android >= 4.4 external sd cards cannot be written to.

The only thing you could do (VERY SPECIAL, not recommended for public apps, but doable in a restricted environment!), if you're certain the devices are < android 4.4: Keep a list of paths that you have seen to work so far on many devices and check all of them for existance properly. Maybe you get lucky.

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 28 '15 at 06:10

I found a solution to read the storage of removable sd-card:

This method retourns the free memory size on removable sd-card in byte.

public static long getFreeExternalMemorySize() {
        String secStore = System.getenv("SECONDARY_STORAGE");
        File path = new File(secStore);
        StatFs stat = new StatFs(path.getPath());

        long blockSize = stat.getBlockSize();
        long availableBlocks = stat.getAvailableBlocks();

        return availableBlocks * blockSize;
}

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Apr 28 '15 at 06:47

You can get an idea after reading the following links.

http://developer.android.com/guide/topics/data/data-storage.html#filesExternal

for handling sd card. Check whether sd card is mounted before you access.

http://developer.android.com/training/basics/data-storage/files.html#WriteExternalStorage

Check sd card is writable and readable.

http://developer.android.com/training/basics/data-storage/files.html#GetFreeSpace

to get the free space in sdcard or internal storage.

Android: How to get storage of external sd-card?

3 Answers3