The excuse ‘my phone died’ is used quite often - and most of the time people don’t buy it.
In order to keep us honest, a new app lets friends and family sync up to see each other’s battery status.
Dubbed Battery Share, users are able to see other user’s battery power level, know when someone is charging their phone and receive notifications if anyone is running low on juice - assuming they agree to being tracked.
'I created this app because I have a few friends who I suspected never charged their phones, and were near impossible to get a hold of,' Terry Demco, creator of Battery Share, told DailyMail.com.
'My suspicions were confirmed when I got them to beta test this app.
'I have one friend who is perpetually at a charge of about 25%, and goes from place to place getting 5 minutes of charging here and there.'
'Then of course there are other people manage to keep their charge up most of the day, it just depends on the person.'
'I really needed to get a hold of someone, and couldn’t. I figured that I must not be the only one this has happened to.
'So from that, came this app.'
Battery Share has a built-in status bar that lists all those who have opted-in to sharing their status, allowing you to see who has a full bar and who needs to plug in.
And if your friend or family is running on low, Battery Share will send them a friendly reminder that to both you and them.
The technology behind the scenes monitors the phone's battery over the course of the day and if the battery level drops below a certain threshold, will trigger a notification that will alert your friends,' Demco said.
'When the phone is charged to a certain point, the trigger is reset. If the phone then drops below that threshold again, another notification is sent out.'
Users who host the app also have the ability to see who switched into low-power mode.
To start tracking your friends’ and families’ battery power, simply download the app in the Apple App Store (it is only available for iOS users and for $0.99).
You can then invite who you’d like keep tabs and once the request is accepted that person is added to the list.
And everyone has the option to stop the app from sending batter updates with a single switch.
Battery Share takes things one-step and uses its syncing to allow in app calling.
After selecting a specific condition, users will see a ‘Call’ button that males VoIP calls – similar to how Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp have their system setup.
The app’s description in the Apple Store says it only works with an internet connection and ‘low battery notifications may not be delivered if network conditions are poor, or the phone is powered down quickly’.
If you do find that your phone is constantly flashing ‘battery low’, an Engineer has four simple tricks to extend its life.
'If you've ever traveled out of the country, you've probably had to turn every feature off your phone except for calling and texting,' Paul Shearing, a chemical engineer at the University College London told DailyMail.com
'Turning off the extra features ensures your battery will last longer, because there are a lot of hungry apps that are draining your battery without your realizing it.'
Shearing explained that a smartphone uses a lot of power just to keep apps up-to-date.
Turning off the 'background refresh' setting on these apps can save that power for keeping your phone alive, and the same goes for notifications.
Another trick to improving your battery life is to make sure your phone never gets too hot.
A smartphone is a mini-computer and has the same parts except for a cooling fan. When your phone is overheating the CPU chip is also operating full force, which uses a lot of your battery life.
A CPU chip is a very powerful components in both a computer and smartphone, and it's similar to a car engine. Just like a car engine, it doesn't need that much power to coast, but if you want to really go in your car you have to use more gas.
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