3 effective techniques for resolving the Unfortunately, Google Play services has stopped error



Google Play services enables you use GAPPS e.g Google Play Store, Gmail, Youtube etc on your Android phone. You might however find yourself encountering persistent Unfortunately, Google Play services has stopped errors which in turn crashes other Google applications.

Why am I getting Unfortunately, Google Play services has stopped?

You’ll usually get this error when the Google Play Services apk has crashed, encountered a misconfiguration or was incorrectly installed.

How do I fix Unfortunately, Google Play services has stopped?

Here are 3 easy approaches to consider when faced with this error message:

1. Ensure Google Play Services is properly / correctly installed

You’ll be surprised to know that the bulk of the cases where a member reported this error involved a phone which originally didn’t ship with Google apps so the owner decided to manually download and install Google Play Store apk hoping it would work. This often doesn’t work and is why I had written a guide on how to install GAPPS on your Android phone so check it out if you fall into this category.

2. Reset App preferences, Clear Data, Cache and Updates

In some cases, this error is caused by errors in the Google Play Services stored data, cache or updates. To resolve this:

  1. Go to Settings > Apps
  2. Tap the menu button at the top and select Reset app preferences
  3. Still under Apps, go to All (its Show system on some phones)
  4. Locate Google Play Services
  5. Clear data, cache and uninstall updates (if you’re provided with this option)
  6. Reboot the phone

If the issue persists then do a factory reset in recovery mode by following the steps below:

  1. Backup your important stuff (a factory reset wipes your data and media files saved to phone storage)
  2. Power off the phone
  3. Boot the phone into recovery mode using volume + power buttons
  4. Do a factory reset (this will clear both data and cache
  5. Reboot the phone

3. Reflash the phone’s stock rom / firmware

If none of the above methods fixes the issue then you should consider flashing the firmware / stock rom to the phone. To do this, you first need to download the stock rom / firmware; our Android firmware collection is a good place to start checking.

Once downloaded, the format of the firmware you download and the chipset of the device will determine how or which tool you’re to flash with. Before you flash, I strongly recommend you take note of your phone’s current Build Number and backup the firmware in case the process goes South due to you flashing an incompatible firmware or doing something wrong.



2 thoughts on “3 effective techniques for resolving the Unfortunately, Google Play services has stopped error”

  1. Well said Enigma……
    For my case, I flashed a custom ROM (Lineage Os 15.1) on my Galaxy Note 3 Sm-n900v but whenever I tried to flash gapps, they always crash, but on Los 14.1 gapps worked well but I decided to go with Los 15.1 without gapps up to now…..

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