OnePlus has announced a new feature called Optimized Charging, which aims to make your phone’s battery last longer by changing the way it charges. The feature, which was first spotted in beta in December, will stop your phone from charging to above 80 percent until 100 minutes before you’re expected to unplug it. Only then will it let your device fully charge. The limitation is meant to minimize the amount of time your phone spends charging at 100 percent — which can cause its battery to degrade faster over time.
OnePlus isn’t the first company to introduce a feature like this. Apple announced its own Optimized Battery Charging feature with iOS 13, and Asus’ phone software supports similar functionality. However, it’s great to see other companies adopting such a potentially useful feature so quickly.
The key challenge to overcome with the functionality appears to be the guesswork involved with trying to work out when someone’s going to unplug their phone. OnePlus says that its software attempts to use your daily wake-up time, first alarm, or first event to guess when that might be, but after a few weeks, it should learn when this happens of its own accord. In the future, OnePlus says it’s hoping to improve its predictions to account for changing sleep patterns on weekends or changing time zones.
OnePlus says that you’ll be able to turn the feature on or off using the Optimized Charging option in the battery settings menu. The company also says that while your phone’s charge level is idling at 80 percent, it will show a muted notification with an option to override the setting if you need to (similar to iOS 13).
OnePlus’ announcement doesn’t specify exactly when the feature will arrive or which OnePlus handsets it will be available on, but given it’s been available in a beta form since last month we’d imagine it’s not too far away. We’ve contacted OnePlus for more information and will update this piece when we hear back.
Gee, I wonder where they possibly got the idea from.
For all the hate Apple receives they get very little credit for the thousands of features they have made standard in consumer electronics.
Thousands? That`s some impressive hyperbole
Presumably from Asus since they implemented it about a year before Apple even did.
Can’t wait until Apple introduces in-screen fingerprint readers to their phones later this year so we can give them credit for doing it first again.
All jokes aside, I’d give Apple credit for Face unlock. They pulled that off really well, but I’m really hoping the new iPhones do have in-screen touch id. There have been too many times where face id has failed for me in awkward situations. Also, it just feels much slower than touch id to me.
I agree on both parts. Apple gets more credit for "perfecting" existing tech than the people that come up with the tech.
Face ID is great, but half the time I have to use passcode because it’s been trying to unlock unnecessarily and ran out of attempts.
And in this regard, you really do have to take your hats off to them. No other company is able to do this the way Apple does.
But that technology was hardly something unique to Apple. Look at windows hello for example.
Don’t be such a shill. Sony introduced this on their flagships in 2016.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/sep/01/sony-boost-smartphone-batteries-people-are-not-replacing-phones
apple don’t thank google when they copy Android every year
Would be much more useful if you could simply have a user defined battery charge limit. Batteries get little to no wear until charged past 60%
This.
I use accubattery to help with this, but the only thing is that I have to manually unplug the phone so it doesn’t charge over 80%. I would love it if I could tell the phone to stop charging at 80, and not have to worry about it going over. I have noticed though that when I want it to charge to 100, it takes a really long time, and discharging from 100 – 80 is way quicker than 80 – 60.
I set up Tasker so it will send a text to myself whenever the charge reaches 80%. Since I can receive text alerts on my Fitbit, I don’t have to be near my phone. I still need to go and unplug it manually. So a built-in optimized charging would be a nice feature to have.
Charger —> smart plug —> IFTTT
For Android users, you can do it yourself if you use Tasker, IFTTT, and a wemo switch.
https://www.reddit.com/r/pixel2/comments/7vnsmo/how_to_prolong_battery_life_by_using_smart/
Such a gimmick: modern batteries present virtually no degradation of left plugged in*
*Source: Battery University
I think you’ll need an actual source for that. There are way, way too many variables at play to make such an incredibly simplistic statement.
If you want to maximize battery life, you still want to stay within the 20-80% range with lithium ion. This isn’t a controversial statement.
I think he was being sarcastic. I laughed when I saw the post.
I have been using the OnePlus 6 for over a year now and i have never had to charge it overnight due to the fast charging. I usually charge it after i wake up and it’s ready to go before i head out.
Why charge to 80% and then sit there until a bit before they’ll likely wake up? Why not charge to 100%, discharge until a set percentage (90? 95?) and then charge up to 100% again?
…because that would serve no purpose except to waste electricity and add more cycles to the battery? It would do the exact opposite of solving the problem, and would be worse in every conceivable way.
This is literally the opposite of a good idea.
And here I was thinking that phones and other high-end, battery-powered devices already contained circuitry to prevent overcharging and optimize battery life. "Battery conditioning" is a term that used to be associated with that idea. But apparently not…?
Almost all modern li-ion batteries have circuitry to protect the cell in many ways- overcharging, over-current, thermal, deep-discharge, etc.
Battery optimization is still new ground for small consumer devices, because people value usage time and treat the device much more as a disposable. Industries where battery longevity is paramount (satellites, electric vehicles, industrial batteries) have developed and implemented many wear-reducing methods quite awhile ago.
They’re preventing wear and tear on the battery, not overcharging. Batteries have a finite number of charge cycles, and this slows down how many they use.
Optimise battery life? No. Its in their interests for your battery to get rinsed as quickly as possible.
Sony has had this one their phones for a while, it’s a good feature
Nice, just like the optimized charging in iOS 13 and wherever it was before.
But why worry about battery degradation? Never understood it.
Battery swap at authorised repair is just $50-100 for iPhones. Do that after 2-3 years and you get another 2 years of use easily, always with the latest software, in case of the iPhone.
Surely it’s possible to swap the battery in OnePlus too and thus use it for 4-5 years?
My OnePlus 7T charges so quickly that it’s done after I take a shower in the morning. I usually am at 40% in the morning. I never leave it overnight. I love Warp Charge.