1. Dim the screen brightness or use auto brightness
You love your smart phone's large, colorful
display, but it's the battery's main enemy.
More than any other component of your
phone, the display consumes battery life at a annoying pace. Most phones include an
auto-brightness feature that automatically adjusts the screen's brightness to suit
ambient lighting levels.
This mode uses less power than constantly
running your screen at full brightness
would, of course, but you'll get even better
results by turning your screen's brightness
down to the lowest setting that you can
tolerate and leaving it there. Even if you do
nothing else we suggest, following this one
tip will extend the life of your battery
You love your smart phone's large, colorful
display, but it's the battery's main enemy.
phone, the display consumes battery life at a annoying pace. Most phones include an
auto-brightness feature that automatically adjusts the screen's brightness to suit
ambient lighting levels.
This mode uses less power than constantly
running your screen at full brightness
would, of course, but you'll get even better
results by turning your screen's brightness
down to the lowest setting that you can
tolerate and leaving it there. Even if you do
nothing else we suggest, following this one
tip will extend the life of your battery
2. Keep the screen timeout short Under your phone's display settings menu,
you should find an option labeled 'Screen
Timeout' or something similar. On an
iPhone, look for Auto-Lock in the General
settings menu. This setting controls how long your phone's screen stays lit after
receiving input, such as a tap.
you should find an option labeled 'Screen
Timeout' or something similar. On an
iPhone, look for Auto-Lock in the General
settings menu. This setting controls how long your phone's screen stays lit after
receiving input, such as a tap.
3. Turn off Bluetooth
No matter now much you love using Bluetooth with your hands-free headset,
your wireless speaker or activity tracker, the
extra radio is constantly listening for signals
from the outside world. When you aren't in
your car, or when you aren't playing music
wireless, turn off the Bluetooth radio. This
way, you can add an hour or more to your
phone's battery life.
No matter now much you love using Bluetooth with your hands-free headset,
your wireless speaker or activity tracker, the
extra radio is constantly listening for signals
from the outside world. When you aren't in
your car, or when you aren't playing music
wireless, turn off the Bluetooth radio. This
way, you can add an hour or more to your
phone's battery life.
4. Turn off Wi-Fi
As with Bluetooth, your phone's Wi-Fi radio
is a serious battery drainer While you will at times need to use your home or office Wi-Fi connection rather than 3G or 4G for internet
access and other data services, there's little
point in leaving the Wi-Fi radio on when
you're out and about.
Toggle it off when you
go out the door, and turn it back on only
when you plan to use data services within range of your Wi-Fi network. Android users
can add the Wi-Fi toggle widget to their
home screen to make this a one-tap
process, or swipe down from the top of the
screen (twice if you have Lollipop.)
In iOS it's easier than ever to toggle
Bluetooth and Wi-Fi on and off. Simply
swipe up from the bottom of the screen to
display the Control Centre.
The exception to this rule is for location
services, since Wi-Fi can help your phone to
obtain a GPS fix using less power.
As with Bluetooth, your phone's Wi-Fi radio
is a serious battery drainer While you will at times need to use your home or office Wi-Fi connection rather than 3G or 4G for internet
access and other data services, there's little
point in leaving the Wi-Fi radio on when
you're out and about.
Toggle it off when you
go out the door, and turn it back on only
when you plan to use data services within range of your Wi-Fi network. Android users
can add the Wi-Fi toggle widget to their
home screen to make this a one-tap
process, or swipe down from the top of the
screen (twice if you have Lollipop.)
In iOS it's easier than ever to toggle
Bluetooth and Wi-Fi on and off. Simply
swipe up from the bottom of the screen to
display the Control Centre.
The exception to this rule is for location
services, since Wi-Fi can help your phone to
obtain a GPS fix using less power.
5. Go easy on the location services, and GPS
Another big battery sucker is apps using GPS, Wi-Fi and mobile data for monitoring
your location. As a user, you can revoke apps' access to location services, or set
levels (in Android) to determine how much
power they use. In Settings > Location, you
can choose High accuracy when you need it,
or Battery saving when you don't.
Be smart about what you allow each app to
access. Allowing your apps to integrate with
your location, camera, or SD card can be
convenient but is most often not necessary. Granting too many permissions to an app
that never uses them will drain your battery
for no benefit.
6. Don't leave apps running in the background
Multitasking - the ability to run more than
one app at a time - is a powerful smartphone
feature. It can also burn a lot of energy in the battery because every app you run uses a share of
your phone's processor cycles
Some apps themselves are particularly
heavy on battery life. For example,
Facebook has confirmed it is investigating
reports that its iOS app could be to blame
for significant battery drain, and is working
on a fix.
Another big battery sucker is apps using GPS, Wi-Fi and mobile data for monitoring
your location. As a user, you can revoke apps' access to location services, or set
levels (in Android) to determine how much
power they use. In Settings > Location, you
can choose High accuracy when you need it,
or Battery saving when you don't.
Be smart about what you allow each app to
access. Allowing your apps to integrate with
your location, camera, or SD card can be
convenient but is most often not necessary. Granting too many permissions to an app
that never uses them will drain your battery
for no benefit.
6. Don't leave apps running in the background
Multitasking - the ability to run more than
one app at a time - is a powerful smartphone
feature. It can also burn a lot of energy in the battery because every app you run uses a share of
your phone's processor cycles
Some apps themselves are particularly
heavy on battery life. For example,
Facebook has confirmed it is investigating
reports that its iOS app could be to blame
for significant battery drain, and is working
on a fix.
7. Don't use vibrate
Prefer to have your phone alert you to
incoming calls by vibrating rather than playing a ringtone? We understand the
terms unfortunately, vibrating uses much more power than playing a ringtone does. After all, a ringtone only has to make
a tiny membrane in your phone's speaker
vibrate enough to produce sound.
In contrast, the vibration motor rotates a
small weight to make your whole phone
shake. That process takes a lot more power.
If you don't want to be disturbed audibly,
consider turning off all notifications and
leave the phone in view so you can see when a new call is coming in. This approach
is as courteous to your battery as it is to your friends and colleagues.
Prefer to have your phone alert you to
incoming calls by vibrating rather than playing a ringtone? We understand the
terms unfortunately, vibrating uses much more power than playing a ringtone does. After all, a ringtone only has to make
a tiny membrane in your phone's speaker
vibrate enough to produce sound.
In contrast, the vibration motor rotates a
small weight to make your whole phone
shake. That process takes a lot more power.
If you don't want to be disturbed audibly,
consider turning off all notifications and
leave the phone in view so you can see when a new call is coming in. This approach
is as courteous to your battery as it is to your friends and colleagues.
8. Turn off non-essential notifications
It seems as though almost every app now
polls the internet in search of updates,
news, messages, and other information.
When it finds something, the app may
chime, light up your screen and display a
message, make your LED blink, or do all of
the above. All of these things consume
energy.
You probably don't want to turn off
notifications about new text messages or
missed calls, but turning off superfluous
notifications will help your battery last a
little longer.
9. Push email
Having your phone constantly check if
there's new email is a waste of power. Instead of allowing email to be pushed to
your phone at any time, why not change the
setting to fetch mail every so often - maybe
15 or 30 minutes if you don't need to
respond immediately to anyone?
10. Power-saving modes Depending on your phone, you may find the
manufacturer has provided power-saving features that go beyond anything available
in Android by default. (Apple's iOS doesn't
have a battery saving mode.)
Enabling a battery-saving mode manages the
phone's various power-sapping features for
you. It might, for example, prevent apps
from updating in the background, dim your
screen, reduce the screen timeout setting,
disable on-screen animations, and turn off
vibration.
By default, this mode usually turns
on when your battery level drops to 20
percent, but you can set it to kick in at 30
percent instead. And the sooner the phone
switches to this power-saving mode, the
longer its battery will last.
A few phones, notably from HTC and
Samsung, have so-called extreme (or ultra)
power saving modes. These turn everything
off except those necessary for making
phone calls and sending text
messages (even turning the screen to black
and white) and can add anything up to 24
hours of emergency use, even if your battery
is down to 15 or 20 percent.
Other tips for saving battery power
Hidden away in settings menus are usually
plenty of options for disabling things like
sensors or features that you never use, and
more.
Most of these will make a minimal impact
on battery life, but combined, they can
become significant.
It seems as though almost every app now
polls the internet in search of updates,
news, messages, and other information.
When it finds something, the app may
chime, light up your screen and display a
message, make your LED blink, or do all of
the above. All of these things consume
energy.
You probably don't want to turn off
notifications about new text messages or
missed calls, but turning off superfluous
notifications will help your battery last a
little longer.
9. Push email
Having your phone constantly check if
there's new email is a waste of power. Instead of allowing email to be pushed to
your phone at any time, why not change the
setting to fetch mail every so often - maybe
15 or 30 minutes if you don't need to
respond immediately to anyone?
10. Power-saving modes Depending on your phone, you may find the
manufacturer has provided power-saving features that go beyond anything available
in Android by default. (Apple's iOS doesn't
have a battery saving mode.)
Enabling a battery-saving mode manages the
phone's various power-sapping features for
you. It might, for example, prevent apps
from updating in the background, dim your
screen, reduce the screen timeout setting,
disable on-screen animations, and turn off
vibration.
By default, this mode usually turns
on when your battery level drops to 20
percent, but you can set it to kick in at 30
percent instead. And the sooner the phone
switches to this power-saving mode, the
longer its battery will last.
A few phones, notably from HTC and
Samsung, have so-called extreme (or ultra)
power saving modes. These turn everything
off except those necessary for making
phone calls and sending text
messages (even turning the screen to black
and white) and can add anything up to 24
hours of emergency use, even if your battery
is down to 15 or 20 percent.
Other tips for saving battery power
Hidden away in settings menus are usually
plenty of options for disabling things like
sensors or features that you never use, and
more.
Most of these will make a minimal impact
on battery life, but combined, they can
become significant.
Finally, as we've mentioned, it's worth
rebooting your phone from time to time,
rather than leaving it in sleep mode all the
time. This can sometimes cure otherwise
inexplicable battery draining problems.
rebooting your phone from time to time,
rather than leaving it in sleep mode all the
time. This can sometimes cure otherwise
inexplicable battery draining problems.
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