How to Stop Google Drive Upload for PCs and Smartphones

We are all familiar with the Google Drive storage. There are many ways to stop uploading for PC and smartphones.

All the users want Google Drive to function well. But at some point, we don’t want files to upload in Google Drive.

So, without any further delay, let’s get started to stop Google Drive uploads for PCs and smartphones.

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How to Force Stop Google Drive Upload?

Google Drive is undoubtedly one of the most famous and commonly used synchronization and cloud storage services on the Internet, especially for smartphone devices. The free service offers 15 GB of free cloud storage, which seems more than sufficient for a basic user.

But recently, a weird incident happened to me. I was away from my Wi-Fi, and a video file of around 2 GB started uploading to my Google Drive. I didn’t care initially, but that upload made my internet connection very slow. The biggest problem was that I couldn’t find any option to either pause or completely cancel that upload.

Suddenly, large files get uploaded to Google Drive, and it is unable to pause to stop uploading. It will be very tough to use the phone’s internet to visit websites and even read emails.

So here are the troubleshooting methods, and find possible ways to deal with it.

So, with that said, here are the best ways how to stop Google Drive uploads in progress.

How to Stop Google Drive uploads on Android?

Disconnect your device from the Network Connection

Disconnecting your device’s network connection is by far the easiest way to tackle this Google Drive upload problem. When you disconnect your smartphone’s internet connection, the file-uploading process will also be suspended automatically.

Disconnecting mobile internet connections is fairly simple, and I don’t think I’ve to demonstrate how to do that. You can simply put your smartphone on “Airplane Mode,” or you can manually turn off the “Wi-Fi” and “Mobile Internet” connection.

But doing so would also make you entirely offline, and what if you want to send an important email to a client or maybe don’t want to get offline? In such a case, if you own an Android device with Android OS 9 or above, that can be a lifesaver.

Android 9 comes with a pretty amazing feature that lets you disable internet connections for specific apps. For that, you have to follow these simple steps.

Open Google Drive’s app info. You can do that by long-pressing the app icon and then selecting the “App info” option, or you can manually go to Settings> App Management> App List> and then select Google Drive.
Here, you will see the “Data usage details” option. Tap on it.

Here, you will see options to “Disable mobile data” and “Disable Wi-Fi.” Enable them.

How do I change Google Drive upload settings

That is it. Doing this will disconnect the internet connection for Google Drive, and you can still use the internet connection for other apps.

Note— I am not 100% sure if this feature is available for all Android smartphones running Android 9 or above, but I got it on all my Android devices. If this option is not available for you, you can use the method mentioned below.

Disable Auto-sync to Stop Folder Upload

If you haven’t accidentally added a file to upload to your Google Drive and the files are uploading automatically due to auto-backup or sync settings, then you can follow this solution to solve the issue.

Google Drive on smartphones automatically backs up images and other media files, and there is an easy way to disable this.

To disable auto-sync, you have to follow these simple steps-

Go to the Settings on your smartphone.
Search the Google settings option and tap on it.

It will take you to a page with several different settings—select the Backup option from here.

On the following page, you must disable the “Back up to Google Drive” option to stop uploading files to Google Drive. You can also enable the “Use Wi-Fi only” option to backup media files only when you are connected to a Wi-Fi network.
After that, restart your phone.

This method will definitely stop Google Drive upload if it is happening due to auto-backup and sync settings. But if you accidentally put that file to upload, then the next method will fix the problem for you very easily.

Uninstall and Reinstall the Google Drive App

Another great way to stop Google Drive upload on Android is by uninstalling the Google Drive app from your smartphone. This technique is very easy to execute and works almost every single time. Therefore, you can rely on it completely.

To do that, simply follow these simple steps-

Press and hold the Google Drive icon and tap on the “App info” option.
From here, you have to choose the uninstall option.
After that, restart your device and install Google Drive again from the Play Store.
Set up your Gmail account.

The pending upload notification will disappear, and the uploading process will be terminated permanently. However, the biggest issue with this technique is that it doesn’t work with devices in which the Google Drive app comes by default.

For those devices, you have to manually clear the cache and other data of the Google Drive app.

Clear Cache and other app data

Alternatively, you can use this method to deal with the problem if your device comes with Google Drive by default.

Follow these steps.

Press and hold the Google Drive icon and tap the App info option.
Now, tap on the Storage Usage option.
Here, you have to clear all the data stored by Google Drive.
Now, come back and tap on the Force Stop option.
Restart your smartphone.
Open the Google Drive app.

And this will definitely stop the Google Drive upload issue for you.

Note — You do not need to worry about your data because once you reopen the app, it will start collecting all the data from Google Drive cloud servers. You will not lose any data.

How to stop Google Drive upload on Windows PC

Below are the steps to stop Google Drive upload on Windows PC.

Pause the Google Drive app

The easiest way to handle this issue on a Windows PC is to pause the Google Drive app. This is very easy to do and works most of the time.

To pause the Google Drive app on a Windows PC, follow these simple steps.

Open the Google Drive app on a Windows PC. You can either manually open the app or click directly on the White cloud with an arrow icon from the taskbar.
A window will appear. To open it, click on the three-dot menu positioned at the top right corner of your screen.
An options menu will appear, and here, you have to click on the Pause option.

Doing this will pause uploading files to Google Drive immediately. Whenever you want to resume uploading, you can follow the same process, but you will see the “Resume” option instead of the Pause option.

Forcefully Close Google Drive App

If the problem continues, then you can follow this method to stop the Google Drive upload. This method will forcefully close the Google Drive app from your PC for a time until you reopen it manually.

To force stop Google Drive upload, follow these steps.

Click on Google Drive’s “White cloud with an arrow” icon in the taskbar.
Click the Google Drive icon to stop the Google Drive upload.

From the options menu, click on the Quit Backup and Sync option.

Open Task Manager and see if any app opened with Backup & Sync or Google Drive.

This will close the Google Drive app on your PC, temporarily terminating the uploading process.

Disconnect your account from the Google Drive app

The next technique to stop Google Drive from uploading media files from your PC requires you to Sign out from the Backup & Sync app, aka Google Drive for PC.

For that, you have to follow these steps.

Click on the Google Drive icon from the taskbar.
Click on the three-dot menu and select the Preferences option.

Now, click on the Settings option.
You have to select the Disconnect Account option and then click the Disconnect option.

Doing this will log you out of the Backup and Sync application, terminating the uploading process permanently. This is also an easy way to stop Google Drive from uploading media files from your PC.

Cancel Upload Task Manually

Lastly, you can try this method to prevent Google Drive from uploading files from your PC. Follow these simple steps.

Open the “Backup and Sync” app on your PC.
Here, you will see a list of files that are in progress to upload to your Google Drive.
On the top right corner, you will see a Cancel button. Click on it.

It will cancel all the uploading tasks very quickly.

Conclusion

Here, you have a list of different methods to stop Google Drive from uploading files.

It is a very common Google Drive problem that primarily occurs because of Backup and Sync settings. You have to follow a few simple steps, and this problem will be solved.