We’ve all been there. It’s a late train home, and just when you most need your phone to catch up on the news, update your family – or simply relieve the boredom – it’s game over for its battery. Whether your current mobile is getting on, or its battery simply doesn’t share your taste for binge watching, we’ll help you find a better match in our best battery life phone guide.
Batteries have come a long way since the early days of mobiles. Up until the mid-1990s, phones suffered with heavy nickel metal hydride (NiMH) cells that took ages to recharge, ran down quickly, and had a comparatively short lifespan. Things got better with the mainstream arrival of lithium ion (Li-ion) cells, which store more energy and wear out more slowly. The technology keeps improving, with today’s phones packing cells that go all day, charge in an hour or two, and last for at least a few years of daily use.
You’ll often see manufacturers talk about the power of a mobile phone battery in milliamp hours (mAh). This simply describes how much energy they can store, with a higher number being better. A small-ish battery might be rated at 3,000mAh, while the biggest are around 5,000mAh. Generally, a bigger battery lasts longer, but it depends on other things – like how big the screen is, and how efficiently the phone can run.
Stretching a charge
Realistically, how you use your phone is one of the biggest factors in how much battery life you get. The screen is usually the single biggest drain, so anything that keeps it on will increase your chances of running out of charge. A phone’s chip is power-hungry when it’s working hard, so multimedia – and particularly gaming – will guzzle up the battery. It’s also worth considering data: heavy roaming, Bluetooth or WiFi activity drains the power, too.
Perhaps less obviously, the number of apps you install has a bearing on how long a smartphone charge lasts. Many apps operate or update in the background, using power. Widgets may run more processes, exaggerating the problem. If you want to get the longest out of each charge, disable widgets, use the phone as little as possible, and keep the screen off as much as you can. On some phones, switching 5G off can help, too.
And if you feel like your battery used to last longer, you might be right. Today’s phone batteries have a long life, but they do lose capacity over time. Both iOS (on iPhones) and Android now include smart charging features to minimise battery ageing – we’ve tested three-year-old phones that still have more than 90% of their original capacity!
If it’s time for a new phone, the good news is that it’s hard to find a modern phone with a bad battery. Some are better than others, with bigger phones generally having larger, longer lasting cells. Without further ado, then, here’s our guide to the best battery phone.
Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max
Price £1,049 (from Apple)- get iPhone 13 Pro Max deals on Mozillion
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Why buy?The best large smartphone, with a huge battery life
The cheaper optionBuy an iPhone 12 Pro Max
Apple’s latest large flagship is a stunning phone if you can afford it. Faster than any other mobile, and with astonishing camera performance, it needs a big battery to keep the lights on. Fortunately it gets one, with Apple having packed in 4,352mAh.
Apple says that’s good enough for a huge 28 hours of video playback, or 25 hours of streaming video. We’re yet to test it, but based on our results with the iPhone 12 Pro, iPhone 12 Pro Max and iPhone 13 Pro, we’d expect it to last around 24 hours in our looped video test. That’s the equivalent of well over a day’s normal use, even with a bit of gaming or bingeing thrown in.
Samsung Galaxy A52 5G
Price £339 (from Samsung) get Samsung mobile deals on Mozillion
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Why buy?Great screen, camera and 5G with a 4,500mAh battery
The cheaper option A Samsung Galaxy A32 5G
Samsung’s Galaxy A52 5G is a seriously good mid-range phone. For less than £350 it combines a great OLED display with a deeply impressive quad-camera array, and throws in 5G for good measure.
While it’s not especially huge or powerful, it comes with a 4,500mAh battery. Samsung says this will last for 15 hours of internet browsing or 20 hours of video playback. Reviewers have confirmed that the Galaxy A52 5G lasts about as long as the iPhone 13 Pro on a full charge – we’d expect around 19 hours on our test.
If you can’t quite afford the Galaxy A52 5G, don’t despair. The cheaper Galaxy A32 5G has a more basic screen, but it comes with an even bigger 5,000mAh battery, meaning it can also go for a claimed 20 hours.
Apple iPhone 13 Pro
Price £949 (from Apple) – get iPhone 13 Pro deals on Mozillion
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Why buy?The best smartphone you can buy
The cheaper optionBuy an iPhone 12 Pro Max
We’ve said it before: Apple’s iPhone 13 Pro is simply the best smartphone you can buy. Faster than anything else, with game-changing camera performance, nothing except the iPhone 13 Pro Max gets close.
The iPhone 13 Pro has less room for a battery than the iPhone 13 Pro Max, and it packs only a 3,100mAh cell. So, it doesn’t last as long? Well, no, but it’s still impressive. Apple says the iPhone 13 Pro will last for 22 hours of video playback, or 20 hours of video streaming. In our tests it looped a video continuously for 19 hours. That’s the longest we’ve yet recorded, but the regular – cheaper – iPhone 13 was very nearly as good.
iPhone 13
Price £779 (from Apple) buy an iPhone 13 for less on Mozillion
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Why buy?A superb upper mid-range phone
The cheaper optionBuy a refurbished iPhone 11 Pro Max
What’s £170 cheaper than an iPhone 13 Pro, but can almost match it for battery life? Apple’s regular iPhone 13. While the mainstream iPhone misses out on the flagships’ fancy ProMotion variable refresh rate, it compensates with a bigger 3,227mAh battery and a slightly slower version of the hooligan A15 Bionic chip.
Apple makes surprisingly modest claims of 19 hours’ video playback and 15 hours of streaming, but the iPhone 13 lasted 18 hours and 46 minutes in our looped video test – just a quarter of an hour less than the iPhone 13 Pro.
It’s worth stressing that you won’t get brilliant battery life from all iPhones. The iPhone 13 mini isn’t as impressive as the rest of the range, lasting a fair but unremarkable 13 hours in our test. The iPhone 12 range is also well behind the latest models – although the iPhone 12 Pro Max did last for nearly 18 hours in our test.
If money’s no object and every minute of battery life is important, buy the iPhone 13 Pro. If you’re on a budget, try the iPhone 11 Pro Max, which lasted 18 and a half hours in our test. Otherwise, the regular iPhone 13 is just perfect.
Samsung Galaxy A32 5G
Price £249 (from Samsung) get Samsung mobile deals on Mozillion
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Why buy?Decent specs and 5G, with a 5,000mAh battery
The cheaper optionWe’re not sure there is one
The Galaxy A32 5G is essentially a de-specced version of the A52 5G. The most noticeable difference is a major screen downgrade, to a 720×1,600 pixel LCD, but the processor is slower, too.
While the Galaxy A32 5G itself may have a modest specification, its 5,000mAh battery is one of the biggest you’ll find in any mobile. Samsung says it’ll power the phone for around 20 hours of video playback, and reviewers have generally found it’ll last almost as long as the A52 5G between charges. If you’re on a tight budget, but want a battery that’ll go at least all day, that makes the Galaxy A32 5G ideal.
