There are many ideas circulating about how to charge smartphones properly. Some of these are true, while others are myths. For example, if you have a habit of leaving your phone on a charger overnight, it doesn’t hurt to keep a few things in mind.
It is a widespread idea that leaving your phone on a charger overnight may cause problems, for example it will lead to a reduced battery capacity. Well, let’s see what the truth is.
Plugging in your phone when you go to bed means that it will stay on the charger for about 6-8 hours, depending on how much you sleep. This means that at some point the battery will be fully charged, and it will have to stay on the charger unnecessarily for many hours.
What you need to know if you have the habit to charge your phone overnight
Older generation batteries were not yet as sophisticated as the ones currently used. For one thing, it took long hours for them to fully charge. However, this has changed; today, smartphones have much more performant batteries.
According to Business Insider, we don’t have to worry about overcharging phone batteries anymore.
An expert, Kyle Wiens, explains that leaving a phone on a charger overnight does not reduce battery capacity. Battery life depends on the number of charge cycles, how much the battery is used, how much the battery has to work.
Each battery lasts for a specific number of charge cycles – this indicates how long a battery can perform without loss of power. This value should not be confused with the number of actual charges, as a cycle can contain several shorter cycles if you don’t always charge your phone to 100%.
According to Wiens, most smartphone batteries today have a lifespan of about 400 charge cycles, which means about one and a half to two years of life.
According to him, when we talk about declining battery capacity, we need to understand that phone batteries are deteriorating from the time they have been first used. Leaving a phone on a charger overnight will not significantly change the life span of a battery. Smartphones are really “smart”. Each device has a chip that stops charging once the battery is charged to 100%. This means that if you have bought the device from a reputable seller, charging overnight should not be a problem.
In conclusion, overnight charging does not affect battery life. However, there is another problem that should be taken in consideration – overheating.
As Apple warns on its website, lithium batteries used today can be damaged by extreme temperatures; of course, this can happen whenever the phone is charged.
In any case, it is better not to leave the phone on a charger all night.