Phone Battery charging

Rabs

Allo...

So I went and got a new phone today cos my old ones battery is dying (or I wouldn't have bothered)..  I found all the current phones out there so uninspiring OR just way too expensive...  In the end I went with a Galaxy S7....  good enough for what I want and more importantly for me its dust proof (or so they say)...

Anyway. To the actual question.

Do modern phone batteries need to be fully charged these days before you use them? I had a quick look and theres 67% on there already.. But I know that you used to have to charge them first in order that the battery charges correctly or something..

Anyway... Anyone know?

strumjoughlamps

I think a brand new battery benefits from a few full charges to nearly dead to help conditioning.. then a nearly dead to full charge every once in a while..

its probably poppycock but its what I have always done.

Danny1969

Technically a modern LIPO battery has no memory effect and shouldn't in theory be bothered if you only part charge the battery .... unlike the old Nicad batteries which did suffer memory effect.

However LIPO batteries suffer trauma when charging which reduces their lifespan, so they do benefit from being treated like an old fashioned NICAD despite the non memory effect, 

Rabs

Ok cheers peeps... Its currently on charge right now.

ICBM

I try to always charge my phone to 100% and never charge it unless it’s below 50% - it will typically go 1-2 days on a charge, and if it’s at above 50% at the end of the first day I don’t charge it - so I minimise charge cycles. The battery life has proved to be noticeably better than my kids’ similar phones when they haven’t done this.

hywelg

I've had this Sony Xperia Z2 for nearly 4 years. It gets charged every night whatever its battery level is. It sits in a cradle with magnetic charging contacts and I have it fire up every morning , bar Sunday,  with Radio 4. 

Battery isn't quite as good now as it was but I still usually get a day out of one charge. Thinking of a replacement battery to get another 4 years out of it. 

Electro_Ham

hywelg said:

I've had this Sony Xperia Z2 for nearly 4 years. It gets charged every night whatever its battery level is. It sits in a cradle with magnetic charging contacts and I have it fire up every morning , bar Sunday,  with Radio 4. 

Battery isn't quite as good now as it was but I still usually get a day out of one charge. Thinking of a replacement battery to get another 4 years out of it. 

Good luck with that one mate. My wife's Z1 needed a new battery but once installed I couldn't even get it to power up. Went through loads of websites gleaning info and downloading various sony software. Let us know if you get it working because I'm sure the phone is cluttering up a drawer somewhere.

Rabs

By the way I did have a quick look in to this a bit further if anyone is interested.

Apparently it is true that modern batteries don't need to be programmed like the old ones which you had to allow to discharge and then charge it up fully a few times so it reaches its minimum and maximum levels...   The answer I found the most is that with modern batteries you can charge them when ever but the ideal solution if you want to get the most out of them is never to let it get below 10% or above 90%. But in the end every battery only has a certain amount of charge cycles in it. So do as you will really   

Also an interesting side fact.  What happens when you charge your phone over night and it reaches 100% is that it then uses the mains power to function and the battery goes on stand by,