6 questions about your phone's battery answered
If you’re the proud owner of a smartphone the chances are good you’ve had a run in or two with its battery life. While our handsets have become increasingly more powerful, the batteries that power them seemingly haven’t changed with less than a days worth of power commonplace for the heavy smartphone user.
Here’s what you need to know to make the most of the life of your battery.
1. Do I need to charge my battery when I first get my phone?
No. The older, nickel based batteries had a memory effect which meant that they’d maintain a certain capacity based on how they had been charged initially. Modern, lithium-ion batteries don’t need to be charged or calibrated by running them all the way down before charging up for the first time.
2. Does battery life get worse over time?
Yes. Unfortunately your battery loses power over time with most standard batteries having a couple of years of ‘full power’ before declining quite rapidly.
3. Does leaving my phone on charge damage the battery?
Not usually. Modern battery systems don’t get overloaded like their older counterparts and only top up a battery with the power that it needs.
4. Should I wait until my phone battery has gone down before recharging it?
No, you should actually do the opposite. Modern lithium-ion batteries gain nothing from being powered down with long charging cycles actually being worse than short ones.
5. Does turning off wifi and Bluetooth improve battery life?
Not really. Wifi and Bluetooth are not as power hungry as they once were and keeping them on is unlikely to cause a huge drain in battery power.
6. What’s the best way to preserve battery life?
There are a few things you can do to reduce how much power your phone is using.
- Turn down your screen brightness
- Disable location and background app refresh for apps that don’t need it
- Disabling push notifications for email, Twitter and Facebook
Related links:
5 phone charging myths debunked
40 years of mobile phones in pictures
3 tricks to extend life of phone charger