Your Cell Phone Battery Life

Cell phone batteries.

The most annoying little items after about a year in use. On my own older phone, after about a year the battery started to wind down.. after 2 years, my battery indicator would drop by one bar per call. (It only had 3 bars!!)

So I replaced the battery.. sort of.. I bought a new phone, and technically I got a new battery in the process, I hope.

I was tooling around on the Verizon website (I went with Verizon Wireless because under my Consumer Reports online subscription, Verizon Wireless had the best reviews across different markets) and I came across some of the following tips for helping your battery last longer:

Tips for extending battery life
Avoid exposing the battery to extreme heat and cold. (I'm good with that.. I hate exposing myself to extreme cold and heat, so the phone should be safe.)

For the first 3 charge cycles, fully charge the battery overnight and allow it to fully discharge before recharging (battery conditioning). (So you need to be brave and let your phone die on you the first 3 times of use.)

Charge and re-condition a battery after an extended idle period.
A lithium-ion battery may be damaged by extensive overcharging (continuously on a charger for more than 24 hours). (Oops... I might be guilty of that with my old phone.)

Keep your phone, batteries, and the contact terminals clean. The contacts can easily be cleaned with a pencil eraser. (My old phone had bad contact design, or at least a tech at one of the stores told me that.)

Use the battery. If possible, avoid letting your battery sit idle for long periods of time.
Use only the phone options and accessories that you really need. (I tend to minimize my items in use on my phone, so I got that one covered.)

Hope this helps