Getting the Most Out of Your Android Phone’s Battery

• 
• Tweet
• Share

• Tweet
• Share

So you have a powerful Android-based phone. It can check your email, play movies, browse the web, and keep you up-to-date with your social networks. However, if your battery runs out, your phone simply turns into an expensive paperweight.

Google’s Co-founder Larry Page says this about the battery life on Android phones: “If you are not getting a day, there is something wrong.”

I’ve had my Droid X for a little over a month now and with that much experience, I’ve come up with some useful tips to extend your battery life for your Android-based phone.

Widgets

Remove any unnecessary widgets from your home panels. These will use up a TON of battery since they constantly ping servers. The news, weather, facebook, and calendar widgets all ping their respective servers frequently.

Power Control Widget

Use the power control widget to have control over Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, Syncing, and Brightness (in order, from left to right). This can be added by pressing and holding down on one of your panels, choosing “Android widgets,” and then choosing “Power Control.” I typically keep everything off except for the Sync option since I still want to receive emails. If I need to check into Foursquare, I enable GPS temporarily, check into the venue, then disable GPS.

Task Manager

Use the Task Manager application to kill apps that run in the background. One thing that annoys me most about some Android applications is the inability to “exit” it.  The application will just essentially run in the background. I have, however, read that the OS eventually closes apps down that don’t actually do anything. You can set it so it automatically kills running apps every X minute. [Available at AppBrain]

Power Manager

This useful app will dynamically adjust your power settings based on the situation. The free version supplies several profiles/conditions: battery powered, low battery, a/c powered, computer powered, and browsing mode. The pay version allows you to actually customize these profiles. Within each profile, you can adjust features such as the display brightness and timeout, wireless settings, and sound settings. At $0.99 to upgrade, it is definitely worth it to be able to tweak the settings to your liking. [Available at AppBrain]

Social Networking Apps

To fully extend the life of your battery, disable the ability for apps to refresh automatically. Have these apps update when they are opened. On a side note, I’ve found that preventing these Social Networking apps from refreshing automatically helps me stay productive while at work.

Live Wallpaper

Sure, that Super Mario World live wallpaper is sweet. However, it will suck your battery dry every time your screen is on. Using a static image will definitely prolong your battery’s life throughout the day. Wouldn’t you know it, we have an article on how to create your own nifty scrolling wallpaper (Droid X).

Limit the Pings

Some may argue, myself included, that having background apps and widgets is supposed to be a feature of the Android. The key is to limit how often they ping the servers for data. Following some of these tips and finding the right apps in the market will ensure you a full day of usage out of your Android phone.