Reasons GPS Quickly Uses Up Your Phone Battery

“I was taking a relatively short trip the other day and used my phone’s GPS app. I couldn’t believe how fast it drained the battery! Is this normal, or am I doing something wrong? Is it my phone’s problem? Or the app’s problem?”

If you have a cell phone with GPS capabilities, you may have noticed that the GPS drains the phone’s battery much faster than other apps do. One website noted that in some cases the battery drains when using GPS even while the phone is plugged into the car’s charger. Why is that?

There are several reasons for this, but the simplest answer is that GPS requires more energy to run than other apps do.

When you’re using GPS, the system must communicate with three or more satellites to triangulate your location. Many people don’t know this, assuming that the GPS device is in communication with only one satellite. But that’s not how the system is designed to work. Some larger systems—such as those on planes or boats—communicate with as many as twenty satellites to guarantee that the information they are receiving is accurate. You may notice that the battery’s remaining power disappears most quickly when you first power on the GPS. That’s when the device is gathering a great deal of information in a short time.

Also, “once on, always on.” GPS does not go out and grab some information and then wait for you to do something, or update every few seconds automatically. Other apps work that way—such as when you’re accessing weather information or playing a game. But your phone’s GPS app is constantly sending and receiving information from satellites. Because of this function, your phone stays on all the time, not defaulting to a sleep state. All of these attributes combine to eat up lots of battery power.

Is there anything you can do about the problem? Well, one obvious piece of advice would be to leave the GPS app deactivated when you’re not using it. Also, be sure that your charger and charger cord are good quality, as recommended by the manufacturer.

GPS technology is a huge asset to anyone who uses it, so having to recharge our phones more often seems a small price to pay and well worth it to reap the benefits of GPS.

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Reasons GPS Quickly Uses Up Your Phone Battery