Monday 24 November 2014

10 tips to extend / save iPad battery life

Being a proud owner of an iPad, I have noticed that with every major release of iOS, the iPad battery life seems to worsen. With all the bells and whistles that comes with each iOS version, this will obviously consume more of your battery.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                             Thankfully, there are ways you can tweak your iPad in order to save battery irrespective of which iOS version you are using. I have compiled below a few steps that I take ( and you should too! ) if you want to extend your iPad battery life.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              Save iPad battery life

1. High temperature exposure

Do not expose your iPad to extreme temperatures such as leaving it on a hot, parked car. Keeping it at room temperature (between 0-35 degrees Celsius) is recommended  by Apple.

2. Dim your screen

Reducing the screen brightness of your iPad will reduce the battery consumption. Use the slider to increase or decrease the brightness of your screen so that it is easy on your eyes. I usually set it to the lowest value possible.

Tap Settings > Brightness & Wall paper and drag slider completely to the left to reduce screen brightness.

3. Turn off music equalizer

Using features like your music “EQ”or browsing through your media library can drain your battery faster than you think. Most of the time you would not use the music “EQ” feature. Turning it off is a good way to make your iPad battery last longer.

Tap Settings > Music > EQ and set it off.

4. Turn off Wi-fi

With your Wi-fi set to “On”, it makes your iPad search for available hotspots in the nearby region. If you are not going to use the internet at your current location, you might consider switching off this feature in order to save your iPad’s battery.

Tap Settings > Wi-Fi and turn it off.

5. Auto-lock screen sooner

The auto-lock feature makes your iPad’s screen go into sleep mode when you are not using it. Turning it on will cause less strain on your battery.

Tap Settings > General and set it to 2 Minutes.

6. Limit app notification

Certain application, mainly social networking or game app such as Facebook can push notifications to your iPad, even when you are not actively using the app. While push notifications keep you up-to-date with your social activity, it can run down your iPad’s battery with all these ‘polling’ for notices.

Tap Settings > Notifications and remove unnecessary app in the Notification Center.

7. Turn off location services

Location services allow you to locate your position geographically on a map by communicating with GPS satellites or WiFi hotspots. If you are not in need of such a service, you better turn this off to extend your iPad battery life.

Tap Settings > Location Services to turn it Off.

8. Disable “Fetch” for email

I have my iPad set to “fetch” my emails every 15 minutes. This is great if you have the habit of checking your email several times per hour ( like me :D ). However, if it’s not important to check your inbox that often, you better turn off that option to extend your iPad battery life.

Tap Settings > Mails, Contacts, Calendars > Fetch New Data and turn off “Push” .

9. Keep Bluetooth off

The iPad Bluetooth allows you to listen to music via a wireless, Bluetooth-enabled headphone or play games with a nearby iPad. You can also use it to connect an external keyboard. However, Bluetooth technology works somewhat similar  to the Wi-Fi, it keeps searching for nearby Bluetooth-enabled devices actively in the background. Turning this option off, will eventually contribute in extending your battery life.

10. Buy external battery

If you can’t trade off the above features to save your iPad battery, you can consider  replacing your current battery or buy an external one from mophie. DealExtreme is an excellent source if you are looking for cheap batterries.

And finally, if the above tips still do not help to conserve iPad battery life, you might consider upgrading your iPad and take advantage of a more powerful battery.

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