Charging tips for phones

Keeping your phone connected to your charger overnight is a bad idea. Find out why

MOST folk have a routine with their phone – you plug it in and charge it overnight so you won’t find yourself running on empty the next day. But over months you find yourself getting less and less battery life out of that all-night charge. How can this be the case when you’re charging it for a full eight hours? Well, therein lies the problem. It could be because you’re overcharging your phone. Once your device’s battery is 100% charged it stops drawing current. “Modern smartphones are smart,” Edo Campos, spokesperson for batterymaker Anker told Time magazine. “They have built-in protection chips that safeguard the phone from taking in more charge than what it should.” But a so-called “trickle charge” becomes the issue when charging overnight. Simply put, your phone loses a bit of charge during the night – and it draws current from the charger to top itself back up to 100%.

This bouncing between full charge and charging increases the ambient temperature of your phone – which is why your phone is often hot when you eventually unplug it. This temperature rise damages the cells inside, reducing the battery’s capacity over time.

All rechargeable batteries decrease in capacity as they get older. Most lithiumion batteries (the kind used in smartphones) have a rated lifetime of somewhere between 500 and 1 500 charge cycles. One charge cycle is a full discharge (right down to 0%).

The overnight charge could use up one of those precious charge cycles, speeding up the rate at which your bat- tery deteriorates.

“If you think about it, charging your phone while you’re sleeping results in the phone being on the charger for three to four months a year,” says Hatem Zeine, founder of wireless charging technology developer Ossia. “Even though the manufacturers try their best to cover this scenario, the process inevitably lowers the capacity of your phone’s battery.” What can you do to increase your battery’s longevity?

Don’t leave your phone on charge after it hits 100%.

Don’t wait until your device hits 0% before recharging. Rather plug it in when your battery’s charge hits 35-40%.

Use the charger the phone came with or one made by the device’s manufacturer.

Keep your phone cool. When charging, take it out of its cover and don’t leave it somewhere where it could trap heat, like on a blanket.