Billions of iPhone and Android users must check for ‘vampire drain’ emergency now – it’s reckless to ignore it
YOUR smartphone battery may be falling victim to "vampire" apps that suck away its life.
Some apps aggressively consume battery charge on iPhone and Android.
This means charging your phone more often, and potentially even higher electricity bills.
These "vampire" apps should not be ignored if you want to avoid a charging nightmare.
Thankfully it's very easy to check which apps are ruining your phone's battery life.
And if you find one that's causing trouble, change its permissions settings – or cull it from your phone entirely.
How to find 'vampire apps' on iPhone
On iPhone, it's extremely easy to get a breakdown of which apps are draining your charge.
Just go into Settings > Battery and you'll be able to see information about your battery usage.
You can select 24-hour and 10-day views.
If you scroll down, you can see how much battery each app is using.
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And if you tap on them, you can see how much of the usage was in the background.
That will give you a good idea of which apps are causing the most drain.
Looking at the 10-day view is great to see which apps are generally the worst.
But if you're experiencing sudden and unusual battery drain, the 24-hour view may be the best choice.
You can going into each app's battery seconds and turn off background usage.
And if an app that you don't care too much about is still draining your battery significantly, it may be best to simply delete it from your Apple smartphone.
How to find 'vampire apps' on Android
It's a similar journey for Android phone owners.
Go into your Settings app and then look for Battery.
Then you can tap on Battery > Battery Usage to get a detailed breakdown of how apps are draining your charge.
You can see or change how any of the listed apps use battery by tapping on them.
And for some apps, you can turn Background Restriction on or off.
This can help significantly reduce battery drain.
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Google also says that it recommends keeping Battery Optimization on.
If an app that you hardly use is causing significant battery drain, consider uninstalling it completely.