Google Play Services draining battery more than other apps and services
The Google Play Services is Google’s key to your smartphone in a sense that updates are pushed into your phone through this service. While you can find Play Services listed among other apps on the Application Manager, it doesn’t work like any other apps. It’s a collective name for all services Google uses to make Android work properly on your smartphone. Most of the time, the company’s home-brewed apps like the Play Store, Gmail, Drive, etc., are ones that use this service to the max but other apps may use it as well especially ones that require users to login.
Needless to say, it’s a very useful service but it could also be the biggest power hog in your phone. In fact, there have been Android users who complained about Google Play Services battery draining habit. So, in this post, I will walk you through in troubleshooting your device with Play Services being the biggest battery drainer.
For smartphone owners who found our site while trying to find a solution, try to see if your phone is one of the devices we support. If it is, then visit the troubleshooting page for that device, browse through it to find issues that are similar with yours and feel free to use our solutions and workarounds. However, if you still need our help after that, then fill up our Android issues questionnaire and hit submit to contact us.
Now, here’s what you need to do if Google Play Service drain battery more than other apps in your phone…
- Keep Google Play Services up-to-date.
- Update every Google app in your phone that needs to be updated.
- Turn off sync.
- Don’t use task killers.
- Factory reset your phone.
During the early years of Android, Google Play Services were among the apps and services that get updated regularly and it has been proven that such updates bring some kind of improvements to it and other Google apps. The first thing you should do if you see that it’s draining more battery than the rest of your apps is to update it, if possible. Head to Google Play Store and search for it. You would know if there’s an available update because the ‘Update’ button will be enabled. Here’s the link to Google Play Services.
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Assuming that your phone runs the latest Play Services version, the next thing you must do is find out if there are other Google apps, or any app for that matter, that needs to be updated. Open Play Store and go to My Apps and from there you could see which app needs to be updated.
Google Play Services runs in the background as its main job is to make sure your phone is properly synced with the servers. So, try turning off sync in your phone and see if the battery drain decreases. You can do this to individual apps as well.
Other users think that using task killers or managers help but in reality, it doesn’t. It’s because Android has its own task killer. So, there’s no need to install third-party task managers to do the job that your phone can do properly in the first place. If you want to close apps that are running in the background, hit the Recent Apps button and swipe apps away.
Lastly, if all else fails, reset your phone. This must fix the problem as it brings the device back to its default settings and configuration. If your phone has been working properly then one day Google Play Services tops every app for being a battery hog, then it must be due to some firmware or app-related issues. A reset will fix them for sure. So, take time backing up your files and data and then reset your phone to make it work perfectly again.
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