How to Boost Your Smartphone Battery Life

After you use your smartphone for a year, you might have noticed how your device does not hold its charge well compared to the time you got it first out of the box. The more you use your phone, the faster it drains and must be recharged.

However, no matter how big the battery is in your smartphone, it seems to not be able to keep up with your digital needs, which include browsing the web, listening to music, playing mobile games, watching videos and movies, sending text messages and emails, calling, shopping, navigating, among others.

Your phone is like your pocket-sized personal computer. It can do several tasks, but a single charge is not enough to power the device and its vast array of functions.

How does your phone’s battery degrade?

The battery inside your phone works based on the ion movements between negative and positive electrodes. Its capacity to hold charge is the key indicator of your battery’s health.

However, the thing is, the more charge cycles your battery carries out over time, the more it degrades. This all depends on your usage patterns. Do you charge your phone twice a day? Or does your phone last until the next day?

There are phone manufacturers that claim that a lithium-ion battery’s lifespan can undergo 300 to 500 charging cycles before you will notice any strain on your phone’s performance.

Reaching that threshold of 300 full charges will actually affect the battery of your smartphone. It ultimately decreases your battery’s capacity to hold charge.

Your phone can do several tasks, but a single charge is not enough to power the device and its vast array of functions.(Photo credit: img.dtcn.com)

How can you boost your phone’s battery life?

While charging is improving, getting faster and more convenient, the phone batteries, however, are not lasting any longer.

A battery that lasts long is crucial today given that smartphones come packed with mammoth sized displays, multiple sensors, and faster processors that take a toll on battery life.

Here are some of the ways you can boost your smartphone’s battery life:

• Charge your phone the right way. You might not be aware of this but draining your phone’s battery to as low as zero to 10 percent and then charging it all the way up to 100 percent is not healthy. You should keep the battery going between 30 percent and 80 percent at all times.

You see, lithium-ion batteries like to stay within this charge range. The life expectancy of these batteries will increase if you keep your battery percentage between 30 percent and 80 percent. When you are buying a refurbished phone, you must check its battery health first.

As such, if your smartphone gets below 30 percent, charge it up and unplug it before it reaches 100 percent of charge. You should avoid leaving your phone charging overnight every night.

• Reduce the need for charge cycles. Half charge cycles are the best and the more than you can squeeze out of your phone on a single charge, the better. If you reduce the need for charging. you can increase the lifespan of your phone’s battery.
• Figure out what is draining your battery. Before you fix any poor battery life issues, you should find out what is causing your phone’s battery to die

If you have an Android phone, what you should do is to go to Settings > Device care > Battery. There you will get a health report on what apps are running normally. You will see all the details on power usage by apps, and what functions are draining your phone’s battery.

If you are an iPhone user, go to Settings menu > Battery and tap Show Activity.= of battery usage by app.

Through the information you get from the data, you can make adjustments to your app usage or app settings. If you notice that gaming or watching videos and movies is taking up a huge amount of your battery life by running in the background, what you can do is to head over to Settings > Apps. You should that particular app on the list and then go to Battery > Disallow background activity.

You can also manage the app’s background refresh rate on iOS. First, navigate to Settings and look out for the app that you found draining your phone’s battery in Battery usage report. After that, tap on the app and turn Background Refresh Rate off for that specific app.

You should avoid leaving your phone charging overnight every night. (Photo credit:i.pcmag.com)

• Customize which apps can use Location. Whether you are an Android or an iPhone user, most of the apps that are installed on your smartphone constantly track your location. If you want to boost your phone’s battery life, you should turn off Location when you don’t need location tracking. If you keep it on throughout the day while you don’t need it, it will simply kill your smartphone battery.

You can turn on Location while using Google Maps, Uber, or sending location on WhatsApp. However, if you are using your phone for watching videos, sending emails, and apps where you don’t need location tracking, you should turn off Location.

• Reduce the screen brightness. Did you know that the reason why the Nokia 3310 could go weeks without needing to be charged was because of its monochrome display? Believe it or not, the 6-inch+ panels are the main reason that your phone’s battery drain faster. Maximum brightness is handy when you are using your phone in direct sunlight as it can help you see the content on your screen. However, in other conditions, brightness can drain your battery.

You can reduce the brightness of your screen in Settings > Display > Brightness level. Move the slider to a more comfortable level. You should also disable Adaptive brightness. You see, this feature is easily fooled by indoor lighting and it might raise the screen brightness even though you don’t need it to.

If you own a refurbished phone or you are planning on purchasing a refurbished phone at QwikFone, you can be assured that you will get a device with a brand-new battery. The original battery of the phone is replaced by a new battery. This is to ensure proper performance for the pristine condition of your phone.

When buying a refurbished phone, you will be able to check its battery health from the phone’s settings in an iPhone while Android phones have apps that can help you inspect the phone’s battery health.

Author Bio: Vijay Laxmi works as an international technology consultant helping organizations with technology related solutions. She has worked for various sectors such as cyber security, mobile apps, web development, creative agencies, telecommunications, etc.