Mobile battery life - switch off at night or not

bargains83

It would be quite beneficial tbh turning it off every night and save quite a significant amount of energy.

If we assume your phone lasts 180 hours in standby, when manufacturers quote this they mean the phone is on but not doing anything. For calculation purposes lets say you recieved no calls or texts at all in that time. Then it should last 7.5 days left on

If you turn it off at 11PM and back on at 7AM, thats 8 hours per day of standby time your saving. So for every 2 nights you switch the phone off you would gain a full days usage between the hours of 7AM - 11PM.

so 7.5 days of standby normally would become 11 and a quarter days standby.

Which is 34% more standby time!.

Of course all this is variable, because you are likely to be making/recieving texts/calls which reduces the amount of available standby time. In addition to this, when you turn your phone on it seeks out a network signal which takes more power.

But in short, yes by turning your phone of at night you save energy and won't have to charge your phone as often. There is absolutely no way that a 34% gain in usage time could be completely diminished just from the extra power needed from switching off and on once a day.

alnsv1000s

If you dont need to have it switched on at night then switch it off. If you do want it on then dont turn it off.

Depends on your circumstances.

My N95 gets charged in my car for an hour on the way to work and an hour on the way home. If it needs a top up at other times due to heavy Internet or use many calls I just top it up. Still has the same battery as 14 months ago and still going strong. When I do need a new battery I will replace it for a decent one for £10-15.

roddydogs

Yes believe it or not-if you switch it off at night, the battery lasts longer revelation!

virgo17

bargains83 wrote: »

With all rechargeable batteries it is best to charge fully and discharge fully before recharging. Avoid 'top-up charges' to prolong the lifetime of any rechargeable battery.

This is all very good advice.

I fully concur that it is no longer necessary to give a new battery a 16 or 24 hour charge. Usually the manual will suggest between 2 to 5 hours or whatever results in the charge indicator showing full. The myth of trickle charging for 24 hours is a thing of the past with older battery technology.

The only thing I would add is that for many people it isn't possible to fully discharge their batteries all the time. My technique is to fully discharge as often as possible, usually at the weekend when the phone is sitting at home. During the week or before an important outing a top-up is acceptable.

V.

Idiophreak

Is this thread a wind up?

Having the phone on uses more power than having it off - so of course the battery will last longer if you turn it off overnight...

Personally I leave mine on, mainly because it takes a good 2 minutes to power up and the battery will still last for a number of days anyway ...

bargains83

The OP wanted to know if it was worthwhile switching off at night and if a significant amount of standby time was gained by doing so. Its a perfectly plausable question in an age where we are told that items left in standby take almost as much power as being left on and other people saying its complete tripe.

Some phones use the main battery to remember clock/calendar data, even though this uses insignificant power some people might believe that switching of at night gave negligible benefits.

As my calculations proved there is upto 34% more standby time to be gained by turning off at night so we have proven the point that it is worth it if you can be bothered to do so. Personally I wouldn't even attempt getting into the routine of turning my phone off at night because I know i'd forget, I have it in silent/vibrate most of the time anyway so there is no chance of been awoken by moonlight phone calls.

Viper_7

bargains83 wrote: »

The 16 hours+ thing for the battery isn't true, certainly not for current battery technology.

Totally agree, but at the time of writing had no idea what the battery capacity was, so 16+ was a catch all. Point was to charge it fully before usage.
Even with modern batteries full charge discharge cycles are better than top ups. with regards to longevity.

The answer was always going to be turn it off at the end of the day.

Regarding leaving TV's on standby etc. I'm afraid I do.
Reason being is that it's a soft power up/down.

Turning it off and on Fully all the time results in the on/off switch packing up or other components failing! Replacing said parts with newly manufactured parts probably uses more energy than leaving on standby.
Same goes with computers, it's those initial spikes that damage them in the long run.

Vipes

judderman62

Thanks all who have responded in a helpful and courteous manner. Most helpful.

to the 2 or so who displayed sarcasm and no benefit to the thread - why bother ? Seriously what's the point - this subject as with powering down computers tends to have split opinions and I just wanted to get some opinions - just because you hold very strongly with one opinion doesn't mean you are right and those who hold the opposite view are all wrong. If you can't offer anything constructive to a thread why not just stay out of said thread

Thanks again :beer::beer:

trish06

Hi does your phone have bluetooth ?
if so make sure its switched off when you not using it as this is a big drain on battery :beer:

judderman62

It does and it was one of the 1st things I did switch off - thanks for the pointer though Trish :beer::beer: