Every iPhone user has noticed that the new firmware drains the iPhone battery much quicker than previous firmware versions…which makes sense, considering all that the 3.0 firmware is capable of. There’s a ton of tips out there that claim to help increase the iPhone’s battery life. While they all sure do help a little, they aren’t all quite necessary. Take a look at these common iPhone battery saving tips, and then we’ll discuss what you should actually do to keep your battery alive:
13 Unrealistic Steps to Saving Battery Life:
1. Minimize use of location services
Since this requires the use of GPS, using location services sucks more energy from your battery. Use it only when really necessary (that means don’t go on Maps just because you’re bored).
2. Turn off Push Notifications and Push Mail
Although that defies the whole point of having Push, if you’re certain you don’t need it, turn it off. If you have a Push email account set up, turning the push off temporarily will save some battery.
3. Fetch new data less frequently
Your iPhone expends battery life by automatically leaving “sleep” mode and going to look for new emails. Rather than having it set to “Every 15 minutes”, go in and set it to “Manually” or “Hourly”, since that’ll be easier on your battery.
4. Turn off WiFi
Both WiFi and “seeking” new WiFi connections drain battery power. Turn them off when not in need of high speed internet.
5. Turn down screen brightness
When you’re in battery life saver mode, turn the brightness all the way down. It doesn’t take a genius to understand that more brightness = more power consumed.
6. Turn off 3G
If you’re really low on battery, and are willing to do whatever it takes to keep the phone alive for emergency situations, then go and turn off 3G. Hey, EDGE sucks, but it still works.
7. Turn off EQ
Applying EQ settings to your iPod apparently drains extra battery. If you’re planning on keeping your phone alive all day, turn the EQ settings off.
8. Set Auto-Lock to 1 Minute
When you’re not using your phone, lock it. And just in case, put your iPhone to the shortest possible auto-lock setting so that it locks automatically (and quickly) when you aren’t active.
9. Turn Off Vibrate in Games
A lot of games have very frequent vibrations, which drain battery life. If you can, turn them off in the game’s settings.
10. Don’t download from iTunes or App Store wirelessly
Downloading apps and media is hard on the battery. Just wait until you get home and use your computer.
11. Use graphically detailed apps less frequently
Games like Need For Speed drain the battery extremely rapidly, so use them sparingly.
12. Stay updated with the latest firmware
Apple’s minor firmware updates frequently introduce some new methods of functionality which are better on battery life.
13. Don’t use bluetooth
Bluetooth, whether you’re using it to connect to a wireless headset or some A2DP device, is terrible if you want to keep your iPhone alive and breathing for more than a couple hours.
Again, of course these tips do indeed all increase battery life, but if you implement them all, you’ll no longer be using a smart phone. You might as well be using a phone from 1985 that cost $6.00 instead of all the iPhone which your dishing out major bucks for.
In other words, by turning off all the features, you’re no longer getting your moneys worth. But at the same time, you don’t want your battery to do early. So, what do you do? Well, we found a happy compromise in the middle.
5 Realistic Steps to Save Battery Life
1. Turn down your screen brightness
Most people keep the brightness all the way up because they think it makes their phones look better. Turn it down half way.
2. Fetch new data less frequently
Most of the day, you don’t need to fetch every 15 minutes. Set it to an hour or manual.
3. Get a car charger
You can find a car charger for $20, and it’ll be the best $20 you’ve ever spent. Whenever I’m driving anywhere, I’ve gotten into the habit of always plugging my iPhone in. I never get a dead battery. Ever.
4. Get an external battery pack
External battery packs are charged separately and plugged into your iPhone when it needs an extra boost. If you’re a person that relies heavily on the iPhone, then it’s certainly a good investment. For $60 you can get an excellent external battery pack. Go here for a list of external battery packs for the iPhone.
5. Use your discretion
You understand what’s bad for battery life – doing things that look like they would take a lot of battery life. Just be reasonable. Plan ahead. When you know you won’t charge your phone for hours, don’t go playing games. Resist. Don’t pass your phone around to your friends who say “Oohhh iPhone lemme play.” Don’t download music and apps. But don’t go to extremes like other sites (including Apple) would have you go. Don’t take the smart out of smart phone.
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Here’s a tip;
I found that when I updated from 2.2.1 to 3.0 on my 3G, that the batter life did in dead drop badly!
The other day I had reason to use the “Erase All Content and Settings” option on my iPhone. Well afterwards I installed 3.0 back to the phone, and guess what?! Now my battery life is more inline what I had under OS 2.2.1!
Mind you I had done the “Reset All Settings” that some have posted about, but it did not work. It’s been several days now, and my iPhone is even jailbroken, and the battery life is still good!
Gives one some to think about huh?
I should clarify, I did not reinstall 2.2.1 after my “Erase All Content and Settings” option was used. “Erase All Content and settings” wipes the iPhone clean, no OS at all! So when I went to restore my iPhone OS, it was a clean installation of the 3.0 OS.
As an update, it’s been a few weeks now and my battery life is still on par with what I had under OS 2.2.1! I have since repeated this process on my wife’s iPhone, with the same success!
Doesn’t charging your phone when it’s not close to dead actually decrease the life of your battery long term? Is this a myth?
that was applicable to older battery technology, forgot the name of it. It’s called battery memory. iPhone uses different type of battery.
I’ve turned off a lot of those. But my iPhone still dies really fast. Can anyone help?
My iphone was going completely flat in 9 hours, without even using it! Apple upport here in Spain told me to do the following:- “erase ipsw files in mac finder/user name/library/itunes/iphone software update then put this files into the trash”
then empty trash and restart mac. Backup iphone then do a restore, when finished put all your apps etc back on.
After this my phone lasted for 3 days without charge, the only thing I have turned off is location services.
HTH Russ
Recently heard that a PhD student manages to increase iPhone battery life by 12x. More: http://www.ranjith7.com/a-student-increases-iphone-battery-life/
this is really a very useful tips looking forward to learn more from u
The biggest drain on the iPhone battery is Push Notification, esp in emails that are set to push. Set your settings to fetch from the server rather than have it pushed to the phone. Try setting it to fetch hourly or simply fetch manually. It will surely help save you battery.
I was looking for ways to extend the LIFE of my iPhone battery, not how to keep it from running out of a charge faster. Your headline is very misleading, as it has nothing to do with the life of the battery.
your talking about LIFESPAN dave…
I turned of my Push Notifications and my iphone is lasting longer by at least 25%.
Theres some practical tips there … and also as you called it some pretty impractical tips which whilst effective kind of mean having the benefits of an iphone are wasted and you may as well carry around a small brick! the external iphone battery idea is a great solution
Check out Auto3G in the Cydia store. Worked a charm for me. Here is the app’s description: “Auto3G extends your battery life by automatically turning off the 3G radio (leaving on the 2G radio) when you lock your iPhone and automatically turning on the 3G radio when you unlock your iPhone. This way you always have the speed of 3G when you need it without the battery loss. As explained by Apple, this results in up to 100% greater battery life: “7 hours of talk time on 3G, 14 hours of talk time on 2G.” (apple.com/batteries/iphone.html)”
One thing specifically related to Iphones is that try to limit ‘Spotlight Search’ for important things like contact, applications only. Goto Settings–>General–>Spotlight Search. Pick the ones you need and disable the rest. This will help in reducing background indexing load and thus a better battery life.
Apart from specific way of doing certain thing(like how to switch off BT or wifi), How all the tips relate to iphone? its a general tips for all the smart phone… and I guess if you are using a smart phone, you should be smart enough to dig dip in setting tab..
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Great advice. I’ve found the radios (bluetooth or wifi) to be big power sucks on many devices. For people who don’t use those features continuously, turning them off will be a big power saver.
how can i reset my iphone without itunes?
am having problems with my iphone its jailbroken 3g and the thing is battrey sometimes i charge it while its off but still drops from 100 to 80 in 15 minutes and it does not even last for a day.any help will be appreciated.u can email me on this add chivern@gmail.com
This only really works for an Ipod touch, but put it in Airplane Mode. It works for me and it greatly increases my battery life.
Normally, I set the screen brightness down to half or lower and oftentimes mute my phone to conserve battery life. I don’t bring a charger or own an external battery so I guess I got used to being mindful of what I do with my phone for an entire day. But I’m big in using my phone for photography so when it comes to choosing between my phone’s battery life and a good shot, I usually go for the latter and end up with a dead phone. So this brings me to a debate whether or not I should go for an external iPhone battery though I can be iffy with pricing.