We’ve all experienced it before: it can be incredibly frustrating when our phones run of battery. Although cellphones have become more powerful and user-friendly, one of the biggest downsides is a decrease in battery life. According to a recent article from Yahoo, here are some tips for Duke students to keep their phone energized for the entire of commuting across campuses.
Upgrade your software
Engineers at phone companies are constantly revamping software to optimize their products’ performance. Although some of these updates are geared towards increasing roaming capabilities, others are designed to enhance battery life.
Minimize location-based services
Applications such as Maps and Navigation systems require a lot of energy to run. It can be a useful tool to get directions, but applications that use location services should be turned off when not in use to prevent it from draining away at your battery.
Turn off push notifications
Push notifications are updates are constantly being sent to your phone from your email and other apps. Although it’s very convenient to know exactly what is going on in your Facebook newsfeed, it certainly takes a heavy toll on your battery. You have to option to go to your app settings to disable these push notifications.
Set your data-fetching intervals
Apps such as E-mail and Facebook are often pre-set to retrieve data at specific times of the day. The more often you fetch for data, the faster your battery will drain. On just about every smartphone, you can manually setting the intervals that your phone retrieves data. As for services that rely on push services, you can also turn the feature “Off” so that data is retrieved based off of your fetch settings. Lastly, if you happen to have email accounts set on your phone that you don’t use anymore, you should turn them off or delete them from your phone memory.
Adjust your screen brightness
A bright phone display may be easier on the eyes, but it also costs a lot more of your battery life. Set your phone to auto-brightness so that the screen will adjust itself accordingly with the exterior lighting conditions.
Charge your phone regularly
In order to maximize battery life, you should try to fully charge and fully drain your battery at least once a month. Doing so will maintain your battery’s total capacity. However, like all rechargeable batteries, its capacity will dwindle over time and may have to be replaced.
Turn off Wi-Fi when not in use
Since there are so many wireless hotspots available around campus, it might make sense to leave your phone’s Wi-Fi settings on for the entire day. When you’re not using the web, however, you should try to turn it off. You’ll be a lot happier when your phone goes the entire day without needing to be charged.
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