The truths about cell phone battery life: fast charging, overheating, and overcharging

Recently, is the fast charging would make the phone's battery shorten and how to make the battery stay longer become a popular question. Today Inviolabs will help you to find out the truths.

Samsung, Huawei, Google, OnePlus are now even Apple iPhone 11 Pro. Come with a fast chargers is an increasingly common practice, at least for high-end devices. But what we need to care when using a fast charger?

Battery life has become a top issue for mobile phone users. As we are using our phones over a longer period of time, battery life becomes more and more important throughout the day, which has become one of the key features that ordinary buyers look for after screen size. According to Kantar's Worldpanel ComTech Q3 2019 study, battery life is even more important than a good camera.

Now the mobile phone can be fast charged, we have a question: What effect does a large-capacity charger have on the battery of the phone, and over time, will fast charging possibly reduce the phone's power storage capacity? We also  wondered what else we would do when charging, and whether this would cause unnecessary shorten life with the  battery.

In short term, the mobile phone battery will not make big progress.

All mobile phones even most personal electronics and electric vehicles are using lithium-ion (Li-ion) rechargeable batteries. Making longer life batteries is a tough slogan, because battery technology hasn't changed for decades. Most of the latest advances in battery life now come from energy-saving features built into devices and software that makes charging and discharging more efficient.(Such as Tesla)

Another factor affecting our phones is the battery capacity. Compared to electric vehicle batteries, the power of a phone is very small. For example, the battery capacity  of Tesla Model 3 is more than 4000 times than iPhone 11 Pro Max.

First of all, Fast Charging will not damage the battery

The output of a conventional charger is 5 to 10 watts. Faster chargers can increase it up to eight times. For example, the iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max come with 18-watt fast chargers, and the Galaxy Note 10 and Note 10 Plus come with a 25-watt charger in the box. Samsung will sell you a super high-speed 45-watt charger for $ 50.

Unless the battery or chargers are technically defective,  using a fast charger will not cause any damage to the phone's battery.

Let me explain why. The fast-charging process is divided into two phases. The first stage applies an impulse voltage to an empty or near-empty battery. This way you can increase from 50% to 70% in the first 10, 15 or 30 minutes. This is because during the first stage of charging, the battery can quickly absorb the charge without having a significant adverse effect on its long-term health.

For example, Samsung promises that its 45-watt charger can charge from zero to 70% in half an hour. Apple says the fast charger that comes with the iPhone 11 Pro can reach a 50% charge rate in 30 minutes.

Inviolabs had tested the Samsung Note10+ charging speed. Click here for the details. Also there is the testing for Samsung S10+: Three fast charging protocols, Samsung S10+  charging test

Do you know how much time it takes to charge the last 20% or 30% of the battery? The last part is the second charging stage, and phone manufacturers must slow down and carefully manage the charging speed, otherwise the charging process may actually damage the battery.

From iPhone 11 charging test, we can easily found that how the Apple charging management system works. Click here for the testing details.

 Also, for the iPhone 8/X/XS Max all support fast charging, click here for the details.

The battery management system closely monitors the two charging phases and reduces the charging speed in the second phase to allow the battery time to charge full and avoid problems, which is why it can take up to 10 minutes to get the last few percentage points.

You cannot overcharge your phone battery

Overcharging once caused anxiety among users. They worried about that constantly plugging in the phone may charge the battery beyond its capacity, making the battery unstable, which may reduce the overall battery life or accumulate excessive internal heat and cause the battery to explode or catch fire.

However, according to the modern cell phone design, the battery management system cuts off the charge before the battery reaches 100% which could overcharges.

Unless there is a problem with the battery circuit, you cannot overcharge modern mobile phones. They have built-in protections that can completely prevent this. occur.

 If you often keep your iPhone powered on during the day or while sleeping, you can turn on the iOS 13 battery setting called "Optimize Battery Charging", which will monitor your charging schedule and keep your iPhone's battery charge at 80— 90% . After that, it will recharge to 100% before you regularly unplug your phone. This is most suitable for people with conventional charging methods.

You should not let the battery run down to zero

You may want to occasionally allow your phone to fully discharge to help the battery recalibrate its charge status. But this is not a problem for modern mobile phone batteries.

In fact, completely discharging the battery will cause a chemical reaction, which will shorten the life of the battery over time. In order to avoid full discharge, the battery management system includes a safety function. When the battery reaches a safety level higher than the empty battery, the phone will lose power. You only think you have reached zero when you see the last low battery warning.

If you want to maintain the health of your battery more aggressively, plug in your phone when the battery level drops by about 30% (well above the extremely low-stress battery level).

High temperatures may damage the battery

Heat is the real enemy of batteries. High temperatures can reduce battery life.

You should avoid exposing your phone to the sun, away from the window, and away from the dashboard of your car to prevent the phone from overheating, which will cause the battery efficiency to decrease over time. In extreme cases, an overheated battery may explode.

Does it mean you need to store your phone in a freezer? No. But try to avoid high temperatures. If you have been in the sun for a long time, try putting a towel or T-shirt on it, or putting it in a bag with a jug. The purpose is to prevent the internal temperature of the phone from rising.

Third party chargers and cables will not damage the battery

Unless you use a fake or damaged charger and cable, mixing and matching cables and chargers will not damage your battery. However, you may not be able to charge as fast as using the device that came with your device.

Some phones (such as those of Huawei and OnePlus) use a proprietary charging design-the charger has built-in circuits that are responsible for fast charging. To take full advantage of your device's proprietary fast charging capabilities, you need a compatible charger.

Other phone manufacturers, such as Samsung and Apple, are more compliant with industry-standard fast charging rules and allow you to use a variety of compatible cables and chargers for fast charging.

The safest option is to charge your iPhone with Apple certified MFI products, because when using the non-MFI cables with the iPhone, the device may default to the lowest charging speed. Inviolabs provide the MFI USB-C to Lightning cables, with our Inviolabs FastPort series charger, you can charge your iPhone/iPad on full speed.

For Samsung and other  USB-C PD supported cell phones, Inviolabs also provides the high quality USB-C to C cables. With our Dual port Fast Chargers, you can easily charge all your devices with just one charger.

For the Inviolabs charging solutions, click here for the details.

Tips: How to save the battery life of my phone?

To extend battery life, you can use common energy-saving tips to save battery power, such as dimming the brightness of the display, turning off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth when not in use, and limiting background data usage by setting and focusing on applications that use GPS.

But the truth is, no matter how careful we are, our cell phone batteries can only last that long. The trick is to get as much time from the battery as possible without worrying about charging the battery all the time. That's what Inviolabs' vision, fast charging and saving your precious time.