You know smartphone battery life doesn’t last forever. Sure, the smart thing to do is to always have your charger handy. But life doesn’t always go according to plan. So if your charger’s at home and you’re not, how can you stall that powerless feeling for as long as possible?
Here are our top 10 battery tips you can do before you leave home, as well as when you are away and don’t have a charger:
1. Carry a spare charger that doesn’t require an outlet
For optimal charging, use the approved wall charger for your device. But if you can’t be wired to a power outlet, you can still charge your smartphone or tablet battery with an accessory such as the mophie® powerstation™ or a mophie pack case.
2. Pamper your battery
Keep the ports where your battery plugs into your device clean. Don’t let your device get hotter than about 95 degrees Fahrenheit, and limit your usage outside in colder weather, too. For additional reassurance or to give your hot battery a break, you might consider carrying a spare that you can pop in when you’re caught in the red.
3. Upgrade your device
Newer smartphones such as the Droid Turbo 2 by motorola have considerably longer-lasting batteries than older phones. Depending on usage, the Droid Turbo 2 can deliver up to 48 hours of performance before needing a boost.
4. Economize
Turn off Wi-Fi when not in use. Wi-Fi gobbles a lot of power on all devices because it’s always looking for a signal. You can also turn off 4G LTE if you happen to be somewhere without a strong signal. Keep the screen as dim as you can stand it, and close apps when you are done with them so they don’t run in the background. Extend the refresh time: Set your email to get new messages every 15 minutes (or even longer) rather than as soon as they arrive on the server. And whenever possible, put your device to sleep.
5. Turn off push notifications
Yes, you want to know breaking news as soon as it happens or keep up with Facebook® comments the instant they are posted to your wall, but these notifications require power. Turn them off when you need to conserve energy and disable location-based services when not in use.
6. Change your settings
Change the display settings on your phone so that your screen time-out is at a lower setting. Make sure Bluetooth is turned off when not in use so your device isn’t trying to pair with an accessory that isn’t there. Turn off your GPS options, too. Live wallpaper applications can also affect battery performance. While you’re in settings, see if you have the latest software, and if not, update it! Also, make sure you have enough battery life to complete a software update. Note that it also takes at least three days to see battery improvement after updating the software.
7. Do some digging
Look for apps like iOptimizer or Battery Graph that help you monitor your battery use.
8. Don’t turn it off
Really—your tablet or phone will use more juice powering back up than it will quietly napping. When at home, you’ll want to power cycle the device every 48 hours by turning it off, waiting 15 to 30 seconds, then turning it back on. A power cycle will reboot the device, and will turn off any apps that could be inadvertently running in the background and draining the battery.
9. Charge it
But not too often. For optimum performance, “reboot” your battery whenever you can by waiting to charge until the battery is down to about 10 percent. Then, fill ’er up to 100 percent. Try to avoid overcharging it except for newer devices, which is recommended.
10. Have a tablet? Drain its battery regularly
For optimum battery performance in a tablet such as the Ellipsis® 10 Tablet, once a month, let your battery drain completely before recharging. It appreciates the exercise.
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