While Samsung is not exactly known for having the best battery life, the Galaxy S10 series all have pretty large capacity batteries, and thus can last an entire day and then some. However, as always, that is going to depend on how much you use your phone all day, and what you are doing with your phone. It may not last a full day, if you doing some gaming on the phone during the day.
Some users may also run into some issues with battery life, due to some apps going rouge, or using some other features. So we’ve rounded up some tips that you can use to get even better battery life out of the Galaxy S10 lineup of smartphones (this includes the Galaxy S10e, Galaxy S10 and Galaxy S10+).
Turn Off Always On Display
The Always On Display or AOD is a pretty cool feature that Samsung added in the past few years. But since the display is always on, it is going to use up more battery than you’d expect. Now the Galaxy S10 does use an AMOLED panel, which means that each pixel is lit up individually. So it’ll be better than on an LCD panel. But turning it off can still improve your battery life.
With the new One UI software that Samsung rolled out late last year with Android Pie, there are some new options for Always On Display. So you don’t have to turn it completely off. You can choose to have it on all the time, only have it on during certain times (maybe in the evening), or you can choose to tap to show the screen for 30 seconds. Of course, you can also choose to turn it off completely.
To adjust the settings of the Always On Display, go to Settings then tap on Lock Screen. In the first section, the fourth option down, will be the Always On Display settings. Tap on that, and you’ll be able to adjust your settings to your liking.
Change The Display Resolution
The Samsung Galaxy S10 comes with a Quad HD+ display (full HD+ on the Galaxy S10e), which is a very vibrant display, but that high-resolution is likely going to drain your battery faster. Out of the box, Samsung sets this to full HD+, to conserve battery. So if you have changed this since taking the phone out of the box, you’re going to want to change this full HD+ to get more juice. Now if you need even more juice, you can bump it down to HD+. You will likely notice a difference though, so keep that in mind. But for many, the trade-offs are going to be worth it.
Check Your Battery Stats
Wondering why your battery has taken a hit? Just check your battery stats, and you’ll be able to see if maybe it’s an app that has gone rouge, or possibly the Always On Display taking all the juice. To check out the battery stats, go to Settings, tap on Device Care, then tap on Battery. There you can see your battery stats, and if you want even more in-depth stats you can tap on Battery Usage, which gives you the battery stats screen we’ve had in Android for many years.
As you can see from my battery stats page above, the Always On Display does take up a decent amount of juice, even though it’s only been running for just under five hours. Which is why it’s a good idea to adjust the Always On Display on your Galaxy S10. This screen, unfortunately, is not always the most helpful, especially if you are looking for a specific app to see if it is draining your battery more than you think it should be. Samsung’s own battery stats page is better for this. As it tells you how long it has been open in the foreground versus the background.
Once you find the app that is draining your battery, you can then check the settings of that app, or even uninstall it, if it’s one you don’t need or don’t use.
Use Samsung’s Many Power Saving Modes
Say you’re out all day long, and don’t have access to a charger, but need the Galaxy S10 to last a bit longer. Samsung has a few power saving modes available for just this.
To access the Power Saving Modes, go to Settings, tap on Device Care and then Battery. Just below the percentage and time remaining, you will see the “Power Mode” option. Tap on the Power Mode. This gives you four options, you will most likely always be on the “Optimized” mode, which is going to give you the best balance of performance and battery life. Now if you need better performance – maybe for some gaming – the “High performance” mode is also there. For power saving, there is the “Medium power saving” which will limit some features. While the “Maximum power saving” will limit as much as it can.
Tapping on the Medium Power Saving will restrict battery life, turn off the Always On Display and limit the CPU speed to around 70-percent. It will also drop the brightness about 10-percent but keep the resolution at Quad HD+. These you can check/uncheck and adjust as you like. You can usually get about another three hours of battery life out of the Medium option here. That will still depend on how you use your phone, of course.
Finally there is the Maximum Power Saving mode. This will do everything that the Medium option does, but it brings the display resolution down to HD+ by default. This will give you a few extra days of usage, which can be pretty useful, say you’re in the middle of a power outage, your phone will have power for a few days.
These are all of the power saving modes that Samsung has available. They are not as granular as something like what Sony has, unfortunately, but they will do the job. There is a battery saving mode toggle in the quick settings, allowing you to quickly jump into the power saving mode and save some juice, without having to hunt the option down in settings.
Use An All-Black Wallpaper & Dark Mode
This is going to sound like a “duh” tip, but the Galaxy S10 family all use AMOLED displays. As mentioned before, these displays light up each pixel individually. That is how the blacks become so black on these panels. That also means that using dark mode or a black wallpaper is going to save even more juice for you. Luckily, there are plenty of what they call “AMOLED friendly” wallpapers out there, and there is even a dark mode available on the Galaxy S10 now with One UI.
To turn on dark mode, you can just hit the “Night” toggle in the Quick Settings. Or you can go into Settings, Display and then Night Mode to turn it on. In these settings, you actually have some options for Night Mode. You can choose to turn it on and leave it on forever (what most people will do), or you can choose to turn it on as scheduled. Whether that’s from Sunset to Sunrise, or on a specific schedule that you choose. It turns the entire system dark, not straight black, but pretty close.
Now the black wallpaper is another option, but it won’t look as nice as some of the other colorful wallpapers that are out there, especially on this vibrant display, but it will work. You will likely get another couple of hours of juice out of the Galaxy S10 by going with a black wallpaper. Now yes, you may think “I don’t even see the home screen that much” that’s true. But it does still save you a significant amount of juice. So it’s worth giving it a try.
Wrap Up
There are many more things that you could do to save battery on the Galaxy S10. Like not using it. But these are the tips that we feel are the most useful, without turning your Galaxy S10 into a dumb phone. Because, what’s the point of spending nearly a grand on a smartphone, if you’re just going to turn everything off and make it a dumb phone? You could have saved many hundreds of dollars by just getting a flip phone or a cheaper smartphone. With these options, you can still take full advantage of all the power that the Galaxy S10 has to offer.
The Galaxy S10 does have some pretty good battery life, but as mentioned, it may not be the best for everyone. And since most smartphone makers have gotten rid of using removable batteries on their smartphones, it means you can’t simply put in a new battery unfortunately. So we do have to deal with trying to get the most out of the battery that is included in the Galaxy S10, so that it can last all day long, or until we can get to a charger.