If there’s one thing that has the ability to throw everyone into a frenzy, it’s looking at your cell phone’s battery and realising that it’s dying – especially when you don’t have the option of charging it soon! This is especially true for us at Team MissMalini (MissMalini in particular), since we’re always on the go and are always using our phones at various events. Between taking photos, shooting videos, tweeting, Snapchatting, checking e-mail etc, we put a lot of strain on our phones batteries – which is why we always need a phone with a strong, reliant battery. Thankfully, we now just take along an HTC One M9 Plus which has a great battery life, but even still, it’s always a good idea to know how to extend your battery life. Here are a few tips that we’ve picked up along the way – hopefully they will help you out too 🙂
Use your power saving mode
Most phones these days come with a power saving mode, and this should be your first go-to when it comes to saving your battery. If you feel like you’ll need your phone to work a little longer on a particular day, then switch this mode on. This will limit some features of your phone, but will give you a little more juice.
MissMalini’s tip: The HTC One M9 Plus also has an “extreme power saving” mode that will restrict phone functionality to just texts and calls. I use that when I’m really running out of power, but still need to be able to contact some people.
Check your phone’s brightness
We know: a bright phone screen looks amazing. However, it’s also one of the main things that deplete your phone’s battery. So if you’re going to have a long day, it’s a good option to reduce your screen’s brightness.
MissMalini’s tip: Set your screen timeout to a shorter time through your phone’s settings! Your phone’s display is probably turned on a lot of extra time that you don’t even need it, so reducing this can save your battery.
Watch your apps
Apps, of course, make every phone better – but some of them can be draining your battery too. Remember to kill apps that you aren’t currently using because a lot of time they will be running processes or syncing data even when you’re not using them. Most phones have an option in the settings where you can monitor battery usage and see what’s draining your battery, so pay attention to that – and stop any apps that are hogging battery power without you using them.
MissMalini’s tip: Update your apps! Many times, updates for apps include battery performance improvements, so keep an eye out for those updates.
Monitor background activity
Like we mentioned, background activity can use up a lot of your battery power. So monitor how often you allow apps to sync data to prolong your battery life. One big battery drainer can be your mail app, so go to settings and adjust the sync schedule (where possible) for your mail accounts – this can be a big help! You can also temporarily disable syncing of some data when you’re running low on battery.
MissMalini’s tip: If you don’t need your apps to auto-update, then disable the option – this way, your phone won’t be updating apps in the background while you’re trying to save battery.
Keep an eye on your widgets
You may pay a lot of attention to your apps, but don’t forget your widgets, too. Remember to delete widgets you don’t use (you know how you always download a bunch of them for fun but then never use and just leave them on your phone?). Remove the ones that you don’t really use.
MissMalini’s tip: The weather widget uses quite a bit of battery power – especially if you use it to sync weather updates for several locations/cities. Uninstall the widget if you don’t really check the weather (this usually comes pre-installed but how many of us really pay attention to it?) or at the very least, set it up to sync updates only for your current location.
What do you do to save your battery life?
This post is in partnership with HTC.