7 Ways to Preserve Your Battery Life on iOS 8

This article first appeared on Mashable

Image taken from Mashable.com

Those of you running the latest iOS 8 software on your iPhone or iPad might notice your battery life dwindling faster than usual.

That's because the handful of shiny new features added to the mobile operating system are working harder to make your mobile experience more productive. Of course, ironically, that productivity lasts for less time than before.

Users with iOS 8 running on a new iPhone 6 or iPhone 6 Plus are less likely to feel the effects of this, thanks to a stronger (and newer) battery that lasts longer than previous models. But regardless of the model you have, there are quick and easy ways to preserve battery life and add extra hours to its daily longevity.

Some tips are less obvious than others — and many tips can be used for previous software versions too, like iOS 7 — so let's take a few minutes to explore what can save hours of time:

1. Identify culprits

You can find a list of apps using the most battery resources in the battery usage section of the device's main Settings menu.

First, you'll want to figure out which apps are sucking away your battery life most. Apple has added a new tool in iOS 8 that gives a percentage breakdown of the biggest drainers. To identify which apps you should close when not in use, visit Settings > General > Usage > Battery Usage. You can then close out of these apps or just delete them, if they can be spared.

2. Manage Background App Refresh

Just like with iOS 7, the latest Apple software comes with Background App Refresh set to "on." The feature lets apps run in the background while you multitask and continually refreshes content when running on Wi-Fi or a cellular network. It's handy for constant refreshing, but certainly not worth the battery life it drains along the way.

To disable this feature, visit Settings > General > Background App Refresh. You can pick whether you want to turn off the function in general or via an app by app basis.

3. Cool it with notification widgets

iOS 8 finally has widgets that you can access from Notification Center — just pull down from the top of the screen and customize your Today view. These widgets can offer up sports scores, weather updates, transit information and more. The only downside is that some of these widgets poll data frequently and that can be taxing on your battery. The good news is you can select which widgets you want to enable (and which ones you want to keep at bay) by tapping the "Edit" menu at the bottom of the Today screen.

4. Shut down parallax

Some people like how Apple's parallax feature makes it seem like the wallpaper can move behind the apps; others think it's dizzying. Either way, it's one of the biggest offenders of battery life for iOS 8. To turn it off, visit Settings > General > Accessibility and switch Reduce Motion to "on."

5. Stop location-tracking apps

Location-tracking apps can be great for when you need GPS directions or even if you want to keep a geo-log of where you take your pictures, but the constant monitoring is eating away precious hours of device life. You can turn off Location Services completely (Settings > Privacy > Location Services) or disable certain apps one by one. We recommend the latter option, so you can still leave on key location-based functions such as Find My iPhone if it's ever lost.

There's more, too. Selecting the System Services option under Location Services will reveal a collection of other app features that are stealing away battery life, including "Popular Near Me" and "Frequent Locations."

6. Turn down the brightness

This may seem obvious, but your display is draining your battery, and there's no need to have it shine any brighter than necessary. Use the Control Center or visit Settings > Wallpapers & Brightness and disable Auto-Brightness and decrease the setting manually.

7. Don't fetch

We understand the constant need to be connected and not miss emails, but the fetch function — which pushes email notifications to your homescreen — is always looking for new mail and exhausts the battery along the way. Give it a rest and check your email manually via the Mail app instead. To turn off the feature, visit Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Fetch New Data.

Although these little steps may seem like, well, little steps, they'll be able to take your mobile device's daily lifespan a long way.