A smartphone is a small but powerful computer that you carry around in your pocket. It consumes a lot of energy and most people charge their mobile daily, sometimes several times a day.
Nobody likes having to think about the battery during the day and carry a charger or power bank to survive the day.
So to avoid that, here are 5 useful tips on how to extend the battery life of your iPhone!
1. Avoid extreme temperatures (both heat and cold)
When the battery in your mobile phone gets cold, the voltage in the battery temporarily decreases and this leads to a much shorter battery life.
If you already have very little charge left, there is even a risk that the cold will cause the battery to die completely.
This is a concern especially in winter here in Sweden.
So to keep your iPhone warm, you should leave the phone in your pocket as much as possible. Your body heat helps keep the mobile phone warm.
Then plug in headphones and use Siri to control your mobile.
Siri is more powerful than most people know! You can e.g. call someone, create a reminder or control your Spotify. More on that topic in another article!
Having said that, you should also avoid leaving your mobile in front of the sun in the summer.
We've all seen the warning message at some point where your iPhone shuts down to cool down. And with good reason, both battery and other components can take a beating from the extreme heat that occurs.
2. Enable airplane mode
If you notice that you lose battery life quickly and need to save money, you can activate airplane mode on your mobile.
It is often the phone's transmitter and receiver of data traffic that consumes a lot of battery. The mobile is constantly searching to maintain a good connection.
Airplane mode turns off these features. Just make sure you've saved your favorite songs or podcasts on Spotify so you can listen to them offline!
There is also a milder variant and that is the iPhone's power saving mode.
With power saving mode activated, your iPhone will e.g. to do the following:
- Set Auto-Lock to 30 seconds
- Lower the screen brightness
- Reduce visual effects
- Pause automatic downloads
- Pause background app updates
To enable power saving mode on your iPhone: Settings > Battery > Turn on Power Saving Mode.
3. Adjust the screen brightness
Another thing that costs a lot in battery life is the brightness of the screen.
When you are outside in bright sunlight, you need quite a lot of brightness on the screen to be able to see well. But when you are standing in the shade or indoors, you can reduce the brightness quite considerably.
Lower brightness will give your mobile longer battery life.
Apple has understood that it is easy to forget to adjust the brightness of the screen, therefore they created True Tone. Activate True Tone and it will do the work for you by sensing the light where you are!
To enable True Tone on your iPhone: Settings > Display & Brightness > Turn on True Tone.
4. Turn off location services
Location services are very useful for apps like Maps or Weather, but all those GPS pings can drain your battery quickly.
To turn off location services on your iPhone: Settings > Privacy > Location Services > Turn off Location Services
But many good apps need location services to work. That's why it's good that Apple lets you customize your settings.
You can choose to leave the GPS function on as follows: Never, While using the app, or Always. By choosing "While using the app" you can still use Maps, but avoid it draining your battery in the background.
To customize settings for individual apps: Settings > Privacy > Location Services > Select the app from the list.
5. Stop force-quitting your apps
You know when you swipe up from the bottom edge of the screen (or double-click the home button on older models) and bring up all the apps running in the background? We've all been told to force close all apps that are there to save battery.
Of course there is truth in that. But constantly going in and force-quitting your apps in the belief that it will optimize your battery is less accurate.
The fact is that all the apps that you use on a daily basis can be advantageously left in the background as it often requires more energy for your mobile phone to constantly "start up" an app again.
But if you have apps in the background that you rarely use, it's a good idea to close those apps.
Bonus tip! Keep track of the battery's status when buying used
When you buy a used phone, it is important to check the health of the battery so that the capacity is still good.
It is one of the many risks of buying used from a private person.
If you buy a used iPhone from Refurbly, you are guaranteed at least 85% battery capacity.
You also get a 2-year warranty on the mobile, so if, against the odds, problems arise, we will help you fix the mobile (or replace it with an equivalent device).
Do you want to check the battery health of your mobile phone? Go to Settings > Battery > Battery Health. You need iOS 11 or later to see your phone's battery health.
