To make your phone's battery last all day, follow these four simple steps

As cell phone users, all we want is enough battery life. Frustratingly, the older a device is, the less power it seems to have. In fact, the battery life of our phones on any given day depends on two key factors: how we use them on that particular day, and how we've used them in the past.

Cell phones use lithium-ion batteries for energy storage. In this type of battery, lithium metal and lithium ions move in and out of the individual electrodes, causing them to physically expand and contract. Unfortunately, these processes are not fully reversible, and as the number of charge and discharge cycles increases, the battery loses its charge capacity and voltage.

To make matters worse, the electrolyte (conductive liquid) that connects the electrodes also degrades during these cycles. The ability of a lithium-ion battery to store charge depends on its degree of degradation. This means there is a link between the way we handle our devices today and the charge capacity available in the future. With a few simple steps, users can minimize this degradation and extend the life of their devices.

The following are some useful strategies for extending the capacity of your phone's battery.

1. Control battery discharge

A typical cell phone lithium-ion battery should maintain 80% of its charge capacity after 300-500 charge/discharge cycles. However, batteries rarely produce this level of performance, and the charge storage capacity sometimes drops to 80% within just 100 cycles.

Fortunately, we can extend our future battery capacity by limiting the amount of discharge from our phone batteries. Since most battery degradation occurs during deep discharge/charge cycles, it is actually best to limit battery discharge during any one cycle before recharging.

As it happens, our device does have a battery management system that reduces damage from overcharging and automatically shuts down when the battery gets too low. Nevertheless, to maximize battery capacity in the future, we should avoid 0% battery markings altogether, and also keep these batteries at least partially charged to avoid deep discharge if they are stored for long periods of time.

2. Extend charging time

Many of today's mobile devices have fast charging options that allow users to charge them in minutes rather than hours. This is convenient when we're in a hurry, but should be avoided in other situations. Why? Because charging a battery too quickly can reduce its storage capacity. Physically, the shuttling of lithium metal and lithium ions between the electrodes of a lithium-ion battery is a slow process. Therefore, charging at a lower rate allows a more complete shuttle to occur, thereby increasing the battery's charge capacity.

For example, charging a phone in five minutes can reduce the battery capacity by more than 20 percent for that charge cycle compared to the standard two hours.

3. Keep the temperature just right

The exact range in which a lithium-ion battery can be stored to maintain optimal long-term charge capacity is between 0°C and 45°C. Below 0°C, the lithium metal is not as hot as it should be.

Below 0°C, the amount of power available within the battery system decreases as the movement of lithium metal and lithium ions within the electrodes and through the electrolyte is restricted. Above 45°C, the power available actually increases compared to lower temperatures, so you can get more "juice" out of the battery in hotter conditions. However, at these temperatures, battery degradation is also greatly accelerated, so its ability to store charge is reduced over a longer period of time.

Therefore, the phone should be kept out of direct sunlight for a long time, especially in the summer when the surface temperature may rise above 70°C.

4. Use power saving mode

We analyzed the power consumption of different smartphone components in a series of typical scenarios.

We concluded that there are some simple software and hardware strategies that can be used to extend battery life.

✱ Reduce screen brightness. The easiest way to extend battery life while maintaining full functionality is to reduce screen brightness. For devices with organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays, you can also use the "bright when dark" option to see.

✱ Turn off cellular networks or limit talk time. The connection to the cellular network uses the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) module. GSM is the primary energy-consuming component of the phone, so it is beneficial to turn it off completely or at least limit talk time.

✱ Use Wi-Fi instead of 4G. Wi-Fi uses up to 40% less power for Internet browsing compared to 4G, so turning off cellular data and switching to Wi-Fi will help extend battery life.

✱ Limit video content. Video processing is one of the most power-hungry operations on a mobile device.

✱ Turn on smart battery mode. All modern mobile devices have smart battery saving modes (for example, Android has a power saving mode and iOS has a low power mode). These are software features that modify central processing unit (CPU) usage for different applications, screen brightness, notifications, and various hardware options to reduce energy consumption.

✱ Use Airplane mode. This mode typically disables the GSM, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS features on your device. When all of these secondary features are turned off, the device will only use up to 5% of its usual energy consumption with the screen off. In contrast, simply leaving your device idle can still use more than 15%.

Improving your phone's battery availability requires a combination of limiting the use of power-hungry hardware and software, as well as handling the mobile device to maximize charging capacity and minimize battery degradation. By employing these simple strategies, users can extend battery life by more than 40% on any given day while maintaining more consistent battery capacity throughout the life of the device.