Top 5 Tips to Save Your Smartphone’s Battery in Androids & iPhones

You can also save your smartphone battery by activating the Airplane Mode on your phone.

A look at some tips to save smartphone battery.

(Photo: The Quint)

Video editor: Deepthi Ramdas
Cameraperson: Abhishek Ranjan

Processing power and smartphone displays are getting better but battery tech is unable to keep pace with them. So, until they come up with better battery technology, you should take matters into your own hands.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a battery that doesn’t die on you at the end of the day?

So, here are top five tips to save battery on your smartphones.

Turn Off Background Apps

While you’re working on an app, there are several other apps that you leave running in the background that uses the phone’s processing power even if you’re not using them.

Make sure you turn them off by using the phone's task manager. You can also go to your phone’s Settings and select the Battery option, which will show you more options to optimise your battery.

Some phones, using Android 9 and above, also offer Adaptive Battery feature where you can limit the amount of power made available to apps you don’t use often.

You can also put them to sleep when not in use.

Turn Off Location Services

You need to turn off the location services or GPS on your smartphone which is used by multiple applications, like food delivery apps, Google and gaming apps, among others.

Though the GPS on your phone helps you navigate or tell you how far you are from a particular location, it doesn’t need to be active all the time.

You can always switch the GPS on when you really need it.

Find & Disable Apps Using Background Activity

Apps like Snapchat, Facebook, Netflix and even Amazon Shopping use a lot of battery in the background. For any app that’s using a high amount of battery in the background, go to the phone’s Settings and select Battery.

Find the three vertical dots on the top-right corner. Tap on them and select Battery Usage. Tap on the app and you’ll see the option of Background Restriction.

Tap on it and restrict the app from consuming battery for background activity.

Note that doing this will restrict the app from working at its optimum level and notifications will also be delayed.

Optimise Your Phone’s Display & Sleep Time

The longer your display stays on the more battery it consumes. It’s important that you set phone’s sleep time to 15 seconds at least, so that the screen doesn’t remain on for long periods.

Many recent Android smartphones also come with a Doze Off mode, which minimises network use and other resource-intensive services for as long as your phone stays idle.

See if your phone has it in the Device Settings.

You also need to turn on adaptive brightness on your phone which automatically adjusts the brightness of your display according to ambient lighting.

This way, you can make sure that the device’s brightness isn’t always at it maximum and eating battery.

You can also use darker themes or dark mode for apps as black pixels are not lit and require less power to maintain the image compared to a brighter one.

For When It’s About to Die

This tip is a sure-shot battery saver, so make sure you listen closely.

The Airplane Mode on your phone, although was made for when travelling in an aeroplane, but doesn’t mean that you need to be a few thousand feet in the air to use it.

The Airplane Mode cuts off all radio signals from your phone, including Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connections. Yes, this renders the smartness of a smartphone moot, but it helps you save up on some battery which you might need to use later in an emergency.

Some phones today also come with an ultra-power saving mode which like the Airplane mode shuts down major functionalities of the smartphone and offers features like the ones you’d find on a feature phone.

This mode saves a lot of battery power.