Your phone is your most important asset when you are outside, but only if it is powered On. You never know when you may get a deadline of 30 minutes before going outside for the best night ever, and your phone displays “Low Battery”. Fortunately, and with a little knowledge, you can charge your phone in an optimum way, and get as much juice as possible before heading out.
Below is a summary of what you can do to charge your phone faster, if you are in a real hurry right now and don’t have time to read the whole articles, this summary will give you an idea of what to do.
- Turn off the phone while charging
- Use a wall charger, don’t charge from a computer’s USB port
- Use fast-charging technology, if your phone supports it
- Use a good quality USB cable
Switch Off the Phone
It seems a bit obvious, but turning off your phone can increase the charging speed, because no energy is being depleted/used at the same time. Even if you are not actively using your phone, the system background processes will still drain some of the battery, prolonging the charge time slightly.
If you need the phone and can’t turn it off, then it is recommended that you should at least put it on “Airplane Mode”. Signal transmission can drain quite a lot of battery, and Airplane mode will prevent this.
If you can’t even put your phone on “Airplane Mode”, try not to run power-hungry apps such as video games, downloads or the camera app.
Use a Wall Charger
A USB Port delivers less power to the phone (5V, 0.5mA minimum) so it will be slower to charge when compared to a dedicated USB charger.
For example, the Galaxy S5 ships with a 2.1mA charger, while and a standard 2.0 USB port delivers a 0.5mA charge, while a USB 3.0 port delivers 0.9mA charging capacity. So, a Galaxy S5 charging on USB 3.0 port (0.9mA) will charge much slower than on a 2.1mA charger that shipped with the Galaxy S5.
Note that some laptops and computers may provide higher Amperage, but it’s hard to tell, so the safe bet is to use the original phone charger, or a high-powered USB charger.
Some phones can draw more power than the charger they are shipped with can provide — that’s mainly because low-Amp chargers are cheaper to the phone manufacturer.
A powerful charger may fulfill this need. You can try a Tablet’s charger (if applicable) to see if your phone charges faster.
Use Quick Charge or other fast-charging technologies
Some of the new Smartphones are shipping with fast-charging technology, such as Qualcomm’s Quick Charge Technology.
With this technology your smartphone will charge 75% faster (compared to older tech). You can check out this list of compatible phones for Qualcomm Quick Charge technology and see if your phone has this technology.
Use a Good USB Cable
Surprisingly, the USB cable can also affect charging speed. If you have a very cheap USB cable (usually the very thin ones), there is a chance it might not be able to transport enough power (safely) from the power adaptor to the phone.
To reduce the manufacturing cost, these cables contain low-quality metal, or the metal wire is extremely thin, which is why they don’t work well with high power.
It is recommended that you use the USB cable that shipped with the Phone. If it is not available, then buy a good quality USB cable from a trusted brand that you trust.
The methods should give you a better chance to get the maximum possible charge in the limited time you have. If you would like to share any other working method to charge a phone faster, let us know in the comments below.