Quick ways to extend your phone’s battery life

Smartphones are basically small computers. And, like any computer, they use a lot of power. Also like any computer, they’re useless if they don’t have a charge. So a part of most people’s routine these days is periodically checking the battery level on their phone.

If you find yourself constantly dealing with a low battery level, there are ways you can extend the life of your charge. Here are a few helpful tips.

Charge more often

The old wisdom in a lot of online circles was to let your phone battery run down to almost zero before recharging. This, the thinking went, would make your battery more robust and longer-lived. But it’s no longer true.

Most phones now have a lithium-ion battery that will live longer if it’s charged more often. Unlike the nickel batteries installed in yesterday’s phones, today’s lithium-ion batteries function best when they’re maintained at 50% charge or higher. If you let a lithium-ion battery drain often, it will live a shorter life and work at lower capacity.

Unplug your phone when it’s fully charged

When your phone is at 100% charge, pull the plug. If you leave it in, your phone will enter a state of “trickle charging” that can speed the battery’s aging process and cut its lifespan.

Let’s say you leave your phone plugged in overnight. The battery will drop to 99%, then charge back up to 100% again. And again. That’s trickle charging and, over time, it taxes the battery and shortens its life. Also make sure your phone as some breathing space so it doesn’t get too hot. Don’t put your book on top of it when you go to sleep. And don’t put your phone under your pillow.

Turn off WiFi and Bluetooth when not in use

When your WiFi and Bluetooth are on, your phone will constantly scan for networks or other devices it can connect to. This uses battery power. So if you turn off WiFi and Bluetooth when not in use, your battery will last longer.

If you’re going from your home WiFi to your office WiFi network, it’s realistic to leave your WiFi on. It won’t make a big difference in your charge. But if you’re out and about for an entire day, switching WiFi off will extend your charge and the overall life of your battery.

See which apps are draining power

Obviously, a power-intensive app like a graphics-rich game or YouTube will pull a lot of power while you’re using it. But many apps also drain your battery in the background even when you’re not using them.

A cloud-storage company called pCloud researched power use by apps and identified the apps that suck the most charge from your battery. It looked at three factors: other applications an app uses, like the camera or location services, the amount of power those applications use and whether dark mode is an option.

PCloud found the top 10 battery hogs to be:

• Fitbit
• Verizon
• Uber
• Skype
• Facebook
• Airbnb
• Bigo Live
• Instagram
• Tinder
• Bumble

Fitbit and Verizon permit 14 out of 16 possible functions to run in the background, including the four most power-hungry features: camera, location, microphone and WiFi connection. When all those functions are running in the background, they’re burning up a lot of your charge.

On both iOS and Android devices, you can see which apps are using the most power in your Settings. Go to Settings > Battery to see a list of apps and how much battery they’re using.

Dim your screen

Your display uses a lot of power. When you can, turn down the brightness on your phone and you’ll extend your charge.

Turn on dark mode

Love it or not, dark mode can save a significant amount of battery, because the white space on your screen needs power to light up.

On your iPhone, go to Settings > Display & Brightness. Select Dark to turn on Dark Mode. On your Android device, open Settings, tap Display, then toggle on Dark.

Upgrade your phone

As mentioned, phone batteries get old and, when they do, they need charging more often. Globally, the average for phone replacement is about 3 and a half years and 40% of people get a new phone every two to three years. Three-quarters of people upgrade their phone because they find their battery life has grown too short.

If you’ve decided it’s time to upgrade your phone, why not upgrade your service at the same time? To CREDO Mobile, the phone company that supports the same progressive causes you do. We have a lot of great deals on new devices. To see them all, go to CREDOMobile.com.