Anyone who has a
smartphone knows that battery life is an issue. At the moment, the
smartphone industry tends to favor performance over battery life when
developing specifications for their new devices. To be perfectly honest,
I am all for this. I would argue that it's better to have a zippy phone
that acts quickly when I need it to rather than a slow, less sleek
device that can withstand a few days of use without charging.
This is probably because I've mastered getting what I need from my phone
while using the smallest amount of battery resources possible. Getting
the best battery life from your phone can be somewhat complicated
because everyone has a different opinion on what you should use and
which (if any) features you should sacrifice to conserve battery.
Fortunately, I have a simple method that works for every Android phone
I've ever encountered.
Display Screen
As a universal fact across all phones, the biggest drain on your battery
is your display screen. Personally, I've found the auto-brightness
control to work extremely well. To adjust to auto-brightness, go to
Settings
àDisplay settings
àBrightness,
and then just check Automatic brightness. It dims the brightness when
you're in darker rooms (as it doesn't need to compete against other
light sources and glare), but will really up the brightness if you're
outside so that your phone is actually usable. However, if I'm really
trying to conserve battery, I will turn off auto-brightness and set the
brightness to very low (around 25%).
Also, be sure that you don't have an extremely long timeout (inactivity
time before your screen automatically shuts off) as this will drain your
battery. I personally just prefer shutting the screen off manually by
pressing the power button rather than waiting for a timeout; this way my
phone won't timeout on me when I am just reading something on it.
Live Wallpapers
Live wallpapers have a considerable impact on your battery life. Not
using them is always a good idea if you want the best time from your
battery.
Close Unnecessary Applications
If your phone has some applications running that you are not currently
using, you should close them from the Task manager to avoid putting
unwanted pressure on your phone which in turn will cause your battery to
drain quickly.
Reduce Volume of speakers
Lowering volume of your phone's speakers can also have noticeable improvements in your phone's battery life.
The Power Control Widget
If you have a fairly recent phone (anything running Android 2.1 or
higher), you are already blessed with a completely awesome "Power
control" widget. If your phone does not have this widget, you could
always download one from the Play store. This is a must for your
home-screen. With this widget, you can enable and disable
WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, and Auto-sync in addition to adjusting brightness levels between auto, low, medium, and high.
The only thing this widget left me wanting was the ability to enable and
disable mobile wireless networks(3G and/or 4G network). Some phones
allow you to do this by pulling down the "
status
bar" at the top of your phone (where notifications, battery life, and
signal are) and selecting or unselecting "Mobile data." Other phones
allow you to control mobile wireless networks by holding down the power
button. Worst case scenario, you can adjust it in "Settings."
Now, when to enable and disable these features, all boils down to
preference. I only use Bluetooth, WiFi, and GPS as I need it; otherwise
it's off. If you have a WiFi connection available, it's generally better
for your battery to use it rather than using your mobile wireless
network (especially if you get poor signal for your mobile wireless).