The common mistakes you’re making when charging your phone

Charging your phone might now seem like a simple and automatic part of your daily routine, but there’s more going on under the hood than you think.

After all, one of the few drawbacks to our connected modern existence is we’re almost always monitoring the battery life of our phones – to make sure they don’t run out, and charging habits play a huge part in this. Here are some common mistakes you might be making…

Modern phones almost exclusively use rechargeable lithium-ion batteries, and while these batteries have proven to be really size-efficient and adaptable, they still have some limitations. In particular, they’re not best suited to being either completely drained or being left charging while already full. Either of these can slowly but surely drain the overall charge capacity of a battery cell.

So, try not to leave your phone charging for hours and hours, and instead, unplug it once your battery is at 100%. Plenty of phones now include systems to stop themselves charging once they’re full, but this is not as infallible as unplugging it yourself.

Charging your phone in a warm place

This one’s more about safety than it is about your phone’s battery health. Charging many phones will now result in a noticeable warmness as the battery fills up – you’ve probably felt this yourself at times.

This means that it’s really not advisable to, for example, keep your phone under your pillow while it charges overnight, or even anywhere in your bed – blankets and bedsheets can make the phone hotter and hotter over time. This can even result in overheating and risk of fire, which means that the likes of Apple and Google recommend you charge your phone on a clean surface, like a bedside table, instead.

Buying cheap replacement cables and plugs

Find us someone who still has their original charging cable and plug years after getting their phone (if it even came with both of those things) and we’ll be impressed. They’re easy to lose and cheap to replace – but be wary of going too cheap on these items.

The worst cables and plugs out there are not particularly well-made or rated for efficient power supply, so if you use a cable that only costs you £1 on Amazon, don’t be surprised if your phone charges more slowly, or the cable gets really hot while it’s in use. Sticking to more reputable brands – like the original phone manufacturer or something like Anker – is a much better bet, even if it costs a little more.

Buying battery-saving apps

It might be tempting to see if there are apps out there that can help to limit your battery life drainage – but these aren’t worth the risk. On iPhones, for one thing, they’re unlikely to have access to any meaningful settings, and are more probably going to take your money and run. On Android, an app might be able to get more access to your phone’s inner workings, but we’d really warn against giving that sort of power to an app you can’t necessarily trust.

Charging and streaming at the same time

We’ve talked about phones overheating a lot, and with good reason – it’s one of the main risks while charging your phone.

Avoid stress-testing your mobile while it’s charging by doing something intensive on it, whether that’s streaming some HD video, or playing a graphically demanding video game.

The stress it will generate for your battery – in the form of heat – simply isn’t great for its long-term prospects. And while it won’t kill your phone overnight, it’s still worth trying to leave your device alone while it’s charging.