Changing your iPhone’s Battery and 10 tips for Longer Battery Life

December 28, 2008 - Reading time: 4 minutes

I mentioned in a previous post that the iPhone’s battery needs more attention than simpler phones. And you can’t change the battery yourself! That thing is soldered into place… so unless you are REALLY good with a soldering iron or if you don’t care much about the very real possibility of frying your phone, then changing the batter requires a trip to the Apple store.

Changing your iPhone Battery

Take the phone to an Apple store. The charge for replacing the battery is $79 plus shipping and handling, and just like a laptop repair, it usually takes 3 days. The store can loan you a phone for a fee.

I DO NOT RECOMMEND TRYING TO REPLACE THE BATTERY YOURSELF. If you were looking for a DIY article, then let me try to talk some sense into you. This is a DELICATE device. It was not soldered by a human… it was soldered together with very precise robotic machinery. Don’t kid yourself… you are much more likely to kill your phone than you are to successfully replace the battery.

If you are concerned about battery life, there are a couple products available that can extend or augment battery life, e.g. Backup iPhone Battery, Juice Pack, or check out the recommendations below.

10 Tips for Extending your iPhone’s Battery Life

1. Lock It — Just turn off the display.
2. Turn Off Bluetooth — If you don’t have any Bluetooth devices (or if you aren’t using any), disable this in the Settings.
3. Disable Wi-Fi — This isn’t as much of an energy saver as Airplane Mode, but if you don’t need to join any networks (e.g. if there aren’t any or if you’re happy using the 3G network), then just turn off the Wi-Fi searching under Settings –> Wi-Fi
4. Turn on Airplane Mode — yes, you can do this on the ground, and it basically makes your iPhone into an iPod… you can’t use the internet or BlueTooth and you can’t make or receive calls. But it really extends the battery life.
5. Turn off Location Services — Settings –> General. Some applications (like Locly) use your phone’s current location to do stuff, but your battery pays the price when you’re phone is repeatedly asking the world “Where am I?”
6. Turn Off 3G — If you’re traveling where you’re only ever seeing the Edge network (the tiny E in your status bar), then you can probably loose the 3G functionality. Go to Settings –> General –> Network
7. Turn off Sound Check and EQ— sound enhancement requires more processing and often more amplification. I also recommend using small earphones (e.g. the white earbuds) because they require less power than a big set of headphones. Yes, louder volume drains the batter faster, so keep the volume down. Settings –> iPod
8. Fetch Mail Less Often — Settings –> Fetch New Data. Try checking email manually (i.e. when you launch the application).
9. Store it at Room Temperature — don’t subject your phone (and its battery) to extreme temperatures. The basic rule of thumb is that it’ll be comfortable where you are comfortable, so don’t leave it in a hot car or in a freezer. Extremes will shorten the battery life.
10. Plug it In — Yes, the iPhone works perfectly when it’s plugged in. It’s good to take it out and use it now and then to make sure the battery gets its exercise, though.

-- Everett Griffiths