Tips to Boost your Smartphone Battery Life

Mobile repairs adelaide

Smartphones have become a part of our lives and an average person changes their phones every 2-3 years. Irresponsible use shortens the lifespan even shorter. Only a handful of us discards electronic waste responsibly. Batteries, display boards, circuitry, etc are all non-degradable and thus become a burden to the environment. To be honest, smartphones are devastating for the planet as much as they are beneficial for the people living on it. Mobile repairs Adelaide ensures proper disposal of these electronic wastes as a part of the green initiative. So how can you be part of the solution rather than the problem? The best thing to do is to realize the ways in which we are speeding up the life drain of the batteries and rectify it. Below mentioned are some of the proven tips to boost your smartphone battery life further.


How does your phone battery degrade?


You must already be aware that the phone battery degrades slightly with every charge cycle(full discharge & back to 100%). Depending on the usage of the phone, people may need one or more full charge cycles per day. Quick charges would be considered as partial charge cycles which can add up to be a full cycle. A generally accepted battery lifespan is 100-150 charge cycles after which it starts to degrade gradually. Beyond that, the battery can only retain 80% of what it initially could. Beyond that, the rate of decay will be exponential. This is the reason why phones older than 3 years drain out quickly. So naturally, it goes without saying that reducing the number of times you need to charge the battery will increase its lifespan. 

  • Tips to Boost your Smartphone Battery Life

Technology is constantly changing and better ways of optimizing your smartphone battery life are being developed. In the meantime, you can follow the below tips for your existing smartphones and how they are used.

  • Look out for the temperatures

Protect your phone from extreme heat or cold as it can strain the battery and thereby shorten its lifespan. Forgetting the phone(even if it’s a spare) in the car during hot weather or in the fridge when u go to get that leftover pizza, can be harmful to the battery and the phone itself. Leaving it near the stove is a disaster waiting to happen. So next time, maybe listen to music using Bluetooth perhaps.

  • Use Appropriate charging speed

In our busy schedule, phone charging discipline may not be maintained as it should be. In an attempt to get the most out of the charging in a short span of time before we head out, we fast charge the phone or worse use a charger with a higher output power to fast charge which actually stresses out the battery. Also charging the phone from your laptop or CPU may not be an ideal way to charge your battery. Always use an original charger recommended by the manufacturer to avoid any mishaps like battery explosions. Turning down the Wifi and mobile data along with closing all the apps while the phone is charging is highly recommended.

  • Avoid charge extremities

Draining the phone completely and/or charging it a cent percent is not recommended for newer models of phones as it stresses out the battery. In fact, maintaining the charge between 20% and 90% will do good for the battery. So if you usually top up your phone charge, it’s actually good for the battery rather than causing the phone to shut down on its own. Another drawback of an extremely low battery charge is that many functions of the phone may not be able to work and finding a mobile network on a low charge is detrimental for the battery life. Earlier models used to have a battery memory which reduced the useful range if you didn’t charge to full and deplete completely. 

  • Ideal phones are better at 50% charge

The ideal battery charge for Lithium-ion batteries is 50%. In case if you have to store the phone for extended periods of time, it is advisable to charge the battery to half the capacity before switching off. This is much better than charging the battery to 100% as it takes some pressure off. Even while switched off, the battery may continue to discharge. The battery lifespan is improved with better battery life and a lesser number of charge cycles. 

  • Reduce Screen brightness

If you have checked out the summary of the battery usage on your phone, you will notice that the display or “On-time” contributes a large percentage of the battery usage. Higher brightness is achieved by higher battery usage. So it’s advisable to turn on auto-brightness features which change the brightness of the screen according to the light availability if you find it difficult to manually adjust it each time. But know that the light sensor has to work extra to automatically change the brightness which could also impact the smartphone battery life. Also, reducing the screen timeout will reduce the battery usage since otherwise, the screen will remain on even when we stopped using it until the set time is not reached (usually 1 minute). 

  • Switch to a Dark Theme

Displaying a black background uses significantly lesser energy as compared to bright colors or white backgrounds. The pixels used to generate the color will remain idle leading to lesser battery use. This is especially true in the case of AMOLED & OLED displays. Many applications have started including a dark theme for this reason among others. WhatsApp recently introduced the dark theme which makes the background color black as default and can be customized to other dark colors. Although it may feel weird at first, it will eventually grow on you. Besides, it is less distracting with darker colors and helps with sleep disorders. 

In Summary, the life of a smartphone largely depends on the life of its battery as once it stops retaining charge efficiently, many times than not, people replace the phone rather than the battery since the newer smartphones don’t have removable batteries. You could save on the additional cost if you walk into a nearby phone repairs Adelaide for a quick check to see if the phone can be salvaged with a new battery. 

FixNTalk is a leading Mobile repairs Adelaide that repairs all kinds of smartphones at affordable prices. They can also help you to use your phone more efficiently for a longer time.