The way Android P increases battery life

Google has introduced significant new features to improve battery life on Android in the past few years. With Oreo, the company has brought the best improvements ever and this is how it is looking to improve battery life even further with Android P.

Double thing about Android battery life

The battery problem of Android is always a difficult battle. How to build an operating system that allows background and multitasking services to perform quickly without limiting battery-only users to three hours? This is always a problem for older versions of Android until Android Marshmallow (6.x).

In Marshmallow, Google introduced a new feature called Doze Mode. This could be considered a turning point for Android in terms of battery life, because it has made a significant improvement that Google has built for a long time.

Basically Doze Mode forces the device to go into deep sleep mode when not in use. Initially it only works when the device is on a flat surface but has been modified on Nougat (Android 7.x). Now it can work when in a bag, wallet and other containers, basically when the phone is not being used.

In Android Oreo, a feature has been added to know which applications are running in the background or using batteries, to let users see the applications are active. This feature in conjunction with Doze has actually improved the life of the Android battery and indicates when the application works against the operating system by refusing to sleep. And now with Android P, things get better.

The way Android P improves battery life

This year, Google I / O saw a series of notifications for Android, including the P. beta. Google also highlighted some new battery saving features: Adaptive Battery and Adaptive Brightness. Let's take a closer look.

What is Adaptive Battery?

Google has partnered with Alphabet's DeepMind team to develop the Adaptive Battery feature, "prioritizing the applications and services you use the most".

This feature will 'find out' how you use your phone, see which applications are most used, how long they will be used, etc. Adaptive Battery will then turn off unused apps so They cannot implicitly use batteries. This feature also prevents wakelock from waking the CPU in the background, preventing applications from needing to wake up the device because you do not need to use them regularly.

For example, if you use Instagram in the evening, Adaptive Battery will learn this behavior and leave it in sleep mode all day and wake it up the time you use the most. Similarly, if there are applications you rarely use, they will basically sleep throughout until you start them.

According to Google, when doing experiments with Adaptive Battery, wakelock has decreased by 30%. This is really a significant improvement because wakelock is the cause of battery drain.

What is Adaptive Brightness?

Android has automatic brightness settings, but Adaptive Brightness is completely different. With Adaptive Brightness the operating system will use the ambient light sensor to evaluate brightness and then automatically adjust the screen brightness to match the supposedly acceptable level.

With Adaptive Brightness, the operating system will use machine learning to find out your favorite screen brightness. For example, if the brightness is automatically dimmed and you immediately turn it back on, Android will record this behavior again.

When using the device and adjusting the brightness to your liking, the operating system will learn that and then use it for automatic brightness settings. This way, the brightness will always be at your favorite level.

And this also helps improve battery life by leaving the screen in dim mode if it is your preference. However, if you prefer a brighter screen, it will likely negatively affect battery life. However, the details of how Adaptive Brightness works are still unclear, so it is impossible to give accurate information. As Android P grows and stabilizes, we will know more about how it improves battery life.

Change Battery Saver settings

In addition, Android P has changed on how Battery Saver works. In previous versions of Android, the Battery Saver only turned on automatically when the battery was at 5 to 15%. If you want to use it at a different battery level, you must turn it on yourself, but the automatic setting is limited.

1. Instructions for setting up and using "Battery Saver Mode" on Android

But now, it will automatically activate at a battery level of up to 75%, and in the past when in this mode, the navigation bar and status bar were turned orange, now there's only a plus icon. orange on the battery icon to let users know that this feature is enabled.

Overall, battery life has been significantly increased. Users of the Android P beta version since the release said that the battery life was much better than before, this is actually quite an impressive thing.

See more:

1. Extend battery life Android does not need root with this application
2. 9 tips to extend battery life for Android phones you should apply today
3. 10 best battery saving apps today for Android