How to Prevent Your Phone Battery From Degrading Over Time

Having a smartphone that has a battery that no longer lasts no matter how much you charge is frustrating. This is why everyone has to take battery health seriously as there are some habits that make one’s phone battery degrade faster. In today’s article, I will be sharing with you how to prevent your phone battery from degrading over time.

According to Statista, the average person uses their smartphone for close to 3 years. In Nigeria, I have seen people use phones for longer periods than this. Everyone wants their phones to last long till they can afford to get a new one and knowing how to prevent your phone battery from degrading will help you.
Before diving into the tips to help you, I’ll talk about battery degradation and the common things that cause it.

What is Battery Degradation?

Most smartphone batteries are made from lithium-ion as it can share much energy despite having a very small size. It also discharges at a fair rate. Whilst all this make it great, there are still some big issues, Lithium-ion batteries tend to lose capacity after charging and using it over time. Most lithium-ion batteries are said to survive 500 – 1000 charge cycles before they start degrading. A charge cycle is when you drain a fully charged battery i.e. 100% to 0%. When your battery undergoes a large amount of charge cycles, it starts to degrade making it no longer last long.

What Causes Battery Degradation

Some of the things that cause your phone battery to degrade are as follows:

• Over time, the chemicals that make up your battery get old and this can make it lose structure, which can cause a significant drop in its capacity.
• Overheating is another big cause. It is normal for phones to get hot when used heavily, and that is a major cause of battery degradation.
• Overcharging your phone is a bad habit that everyone needs to stop now as that makes your battery degrade. Over-discharging should also be avoided.

How to Prevent Your Phone Battery From Degrading

It is not possible to stop battery degradation but there are ways to prevent your phone from degrading over time. This will make your phone battery to last like a brand new one even after months of usage.

1. Keep the battery cool

One way to prevent your phone battery from degrading over time is to keep your battery, and by extension, your phone cool. Having high temperatures can make your battery age faster and this is not a good thing. Habits like charging as well as using your phone heavily are something to stop as it generates lots of heat.

2. Don’t use wireless charging often

Wireless charging is one technological advancement that made charging phones very convenient. However, it has a big problem, wireless charging is not as efficient as wired charging, and the wasted energy turns to heat which is not your battery’s friend. If you have to use wireless charging, do not use it to charge for a long period of time.

3. Avoid killing your phone battery

A good and proven way to prevent your phone battery from degrading over time is to avoid deep discharges and charges. This basically means avoiding discharging your phone from 100% to 0% straight. Having your battery range from 20% to 80% is the best spot to be in, battery health-wise. So prevent your phone from charging to 100% and also make sure it does go below 20%. Charge at regular intervals to keep it between these two spots.

4. Don’t use fast charging every day

Just like wireless charging, fast charging is another technological advancement that is convenient but not good for battery health. Fast charging produces more heat than regular charging which is bad. It also makes it likely for you to overcharge your phone especially if you fall asleep or get too busy.
Some Android features like Adaptive Charge can help to make your phone battery not charge fast even when using a fast charger, make sure to activate it if your phone has it.

5. Avoid using bad chargers

If you notice that your charger is bad, get a new and genuine one as using bad chargers can cause your phone to charge at dangerous rates which destroys battery health.

6. Change your charging port if it is bad

Recently, I changed my phone’s battery but I didn’t change the charging port which has been problematic for a while. This made my new battery to get bad in less than 3 weeks as it was charged with unregulated charges (going from 0% to 30% in 5 minutes and it was not using fast charging). I had to get a new charging port and battery together and till now, the new battery is going strong.

Now, we’ve come to the end of this article showing you how to prevent your phone battery from degrading over time. Check out our article on how to take better pictures on your phone.

Author: Samuel Taiwo