Accessing Facebook in Safari can increase iPhone 6s Plus battery life by 15 percent

iOS 7 (battery empty 001)

According to The Guardian’s technology reporter Samuel Gibbs, uninstalling Facebook’s battery draining iOS app and accessing the mobile Facebook interface through the Safari browser can boost an iPhone 6s Plus’s battery life by as much as fifteen percent.

Gibbs cited his own testing, which has revealed that Facebook’s mobile application continues to drain the life out of an iPhone’s battery even when it isn’t being actively used.

After removing the Facebook app from his iPhone 6s Plus, the author recorded the battery life at 10.30pm each day for a week. Comparing the numbers to a daily average taken from a week with the Facebook app installed, Gibbs has discovered that, on average, he had fifteen percent more battery left by 10.30pm each day without the app.

“I charged the phone overnight, taking it off the charger at 7.30am, and used it normally,” he explained. “I accessed Facebook for the same amount of time, and for the same purposes, using the social network’s excellent mobile site within Safari, as I had done using the app. I also left the Facebook Messenger app installed.”

Other iPhone owners who conducted a similar test all found similar results. A Facebook spokesperson told the British paper that the company is investigating the matter.

Similarly, deleting Facebook’s Android app can save up to twenty percent of an Android phone’s battery, which indicates that Facebook’s battery drain is not exclusive to iOS.

If you use the mobile Facebook app, you should reduce its reliance on background services by disabling the Location History feature (More → Nearby Friends → Gear icon → Location Settings → Location History) and turn off location tracking (iOS Settings → Privacy → Location Services → Facebook → Never).

TUTORIAL: How to disable Location History on Facebook to extend iPhone battery life

Facebook took a lot of heat last fall over the discovery that its mobile application was using dirty tricks to keep itself alive in the background even though it wasn’t being actively used. After admitting that a “bug” was causing unwanted behavior, Facebook claimed to have fixed the issue with an update.

But has it really?

Source: The Guardian