Battery Saving Tips: The Sony Xperia Z2

By now, you’re familiar with the basic ways to help conserve a phone’s battery, like turning off Bluetooth and dimming backlighting. But these days, the latest superphones also include other useful features to help extend battery life. One such device is the Sony Xperia Z2.

Here are some of the ways to maximize the operating time of this superphone.

Battery STAMINA Mode. The most notable way to extend the Z2’s battery life is by putting the phone into Battery STAMINA Mode when you’re not actively using it, like when it’s in your pocket or you’re at the office. This can extend the phone’s battery by up to four times. To turn this on, go into the phone’s Power Management settings and adjust the slider to activate STAMINA Mode. Data traffic and background activities will be blocked as soon as the phone’s screen has been off for one minute, and the phone will only be woken up for critical notifications, like incoming calls, messages, calendar items, alarms, or whatever other apps you choose to add to the critical list. (Tap the “+” sign once the mode is activated to add applications that you wish to remain active.)  As soon as the phone’s screen is lit up again, all functions resume as normal.

Think of it like your phone being on standby: it’s still on and operating, but it isn’t wasting battery life on applications you don’t need. You can set thresholds so it only kicks in at a certain point: when there’s 50% battery life left, for example. Over time, the phone will highlight unused, battery-draining apps, and suggest you delete them.

Low battery mode. Also accessed in Power Management Settings, turn this function on to intelligently disable non-critical features any time your battery is low.

Location-based Wi-Fi. It’s wise to turn Wi-Fi off when you’re not using it. But it can be easy to forget to turn it back on when you should, thus using up cellular data unnecessarily. Turning this feature on through the same Power Management menu in Settings will automatically activate Wi-Fi when the phone’s GPS recognizes that you’re within range of a saved network: home, the office or even your local coffee shop, for example.

View battery life in percentage. Numbers can sometimes speak louder than pictures. And seeing a numerical figure that indicates how much battery power is left can often more effectively encourage you to curb your usage until you can get to a power source than a tiny depleting image of a battery might. Select this option in the same Power Management menu under Status bar information.

The bottom line
With a 3,200 mAh battery and standby time rated at seven days, the Z2 boasts pretty impressive power stats as it is. But for particularly heavy users, it’s worthwhile to make use of these battery-saving features. They won’t impact productivity but will ensure the phone uses as few resources as possible while it’s tucked away in your pocket.

What’s your favourite battery-saving tip? Tell us in the comments below.