Fast Charging cable overnight ok?

[Not Quite Right]

Heck yeah I quick charge all night long, then on my commute to work it gets plugged into the quick charger in my car, then again on my way home, and then back on the quick wireless charging pad at bed time. I use and enjoy my devices the way they were intended to be used. I also don't cripple my devices functionality trying to eek out a few extra minutes of SOT like its some badge of honor either. My devices seem to last just as long as anyone else's and I have a whole lot stress not worrying about crap that really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of life ...

 

[DRM186]

over night (4+hours of plug in time with no real usage) a quick charger is over kill and will shorten your battery a bit (though not severally as some are stating) I would use a high quality standard charger for this and leave the quick charger for a 30 min-1 hour top off during the day)

 

[jkjoms]

Technically speaking, peak level charging for extended periods can stress the LiPo cells and lead to reduced life of the battery. When you leave a fully charged phone on a charger for extended periods, it goes through a ton of little discharge/charge cycles, and LiPo cells really don't like that all that much when they are fully charged. When you look at how pros charge LiPo cells.... we're talking guys who's job (and maybe life) relies on having that device work.... those batteries are often charged on special chargers that keep the battery at an artificially low voltage (i.e. charge) level to avoid cell stress... maybe 90-95%. So they can sit there all day and night for who knows how long without going to pot.

If you want that LiPo battery to last as long as it can, charging to its highest possible level for the longest amount of time, you only need to do three simple things (in order of importance):

1) Avoid extreme heat... don't leave the sucker on your dash in the summer
2) Avoid constantly going through deep recharge cycles (100% to 5% back to 100%, etc)
3) When it is fully charged, take it off the charger

Now, having it sit overnight now and then, that probably won't be much of a problem. But I wouldn't make a habit of it.

Agree 100%
Personal point of view is to avoid keeping the phone plugged in throughout the night.

 

[wxman2003]

Verizon told me and my sister you're not supposed to leave your phone plugged in overnight. The rule of thumb is charge your phone to 80 % and deplete the phone to 20%. You're not really supposed to overcharge it because it destroys your battery faster.

My rule of thumb is whatever a Verizon rep tells you to do, do the opposite.

 

[hellosailor]

"3) When it is fully charged, take it off the charger"
If you have to do that, manually? Instead of the phone/charger automatically changing the charge rate, or shutting the charger, or going into some other "float" charge routine?

Then your phone is a piece of junk, made by a company that doesn't know how to build rechargeable devices. Or, just doesn't give a damn about how well their devices work.

You might be surprised at how many sophisticated "charge controller" ICs are made by a large number of electronics companies, and used in far more than just phones.

There are lots of bad chargers made without any of them, especially the cheap no-name chargers found on the web.

Sadly, the mass market only cares about "Pretty pretty! Shiny shiny!" (thank you, Cartoon Network) and wouldn't know how to buy a superior product, much less recognize what makes it superior. It is much easier to throw away money on new pretty designs every year.

 

[LanreKobz]

It's never a good idea to leave your phone plugged in overnight, I for one always take it out in the middle of my sleep and always seems to loose about 1-5% by the time I wake up.

 

[erb2000]

Technically speaking, peak level charging for extended periods can stress the LiPo cells and lead to reduced life of the battery. When you leave a fully charged phone on a charger for extended periods, it goes through a ton of little discharge/charge cycles, and LiPo cells really don't like that all that much when they are fully charged. When you look at how pros charge LiPo cells.... we're talking guys who's job (and maybe life) relies on having that device work.... those batteries are often charged on special chargers that keep the battery at an artificially low voltage (i.e. charge) level to avoid cell stress... maybe 90-95%. So they can sit there all day and night for who knows how long without going to pot.

If you want that LiPo battery to last as long as it can, charging to its highest possible level for the longest amount of time, you only need to do three simple things (in order of importance):

1) Avoid extreme heat... don't leave the sucker on your dash in the summer
2) Avoid constantly going through deep recharge cycles (100% to 5% back to 100%, etc)
3) When it is fully charged, take it off the charger

Now, having it sit overnight now and then, that probably won't be much of a problem. But I wouldn't make a habit of it.

Excellent advice. I wish I had read it when I bought my S7 a year ago. I bought two wireless chargers, one for home and one for work. My phone has been almost constantly charging every since I got it, about one year. It is always sitting on one of the chargers. Just recently the screen has become unglued at the edge. I'm betting it is the battery bulging and pushing on it. I have insurance, but it'll take some effort to use it.

 

[talberry]

I've been charging my phone overnight ever since I got it about 3 months ago. Haven't gotten any problems with it yet, because I thought it would be safe to leave it on overnight..
Maybe I should try taking it off the charger once it hits 100%

 

[LeoRex]

I've been charging my phone overnight ever since I got it about 3 months ago. Haven't gotten any problems with it yet, because I thought it would be safe to leave it on overnight..
Maybe I should try taking it off the charger once it hits 100%

I strongly suggest you do.

Well, there are varying degrees of "bad". There are some things you can do... like charging your phone while it sits on your dash, baking in the summer sun... could cause the thing to rupture right then and there. But extended periods on the charger at full capacity like that isn't something that you will see quickly... even three months down the road. And if you do it for a little bit on random occasions, that won't impact much. Like what's been said earlier, a 'full charge' uses up 1 charge cycle's worth of your battery's duty cycle. If you fully charge your phone then leave it on the charger for a several hours, that charge session may have burnt 1.5 or 1.8 charge cycles. You are basically aging it prematurely.

 

[pappcam]

Wow. People still think charging your phone overnight wrecks the phone? Haven't we moved on from that yet?

I've charged every phone I've had overnight and that includes my Note 4 and S7E that both used fast charging. If I diminished my battery capacity by 5% or 10% in the 2 years I used the phone then that is fine with me. I sure as hell won't be nervously hovering over my phone ready to rip it off the charger the second it hits 100%.

I seriously can't believe that people are still spreading this information.

 

[Erm10]

I've read so many different opinions that I don't know what to believe when it comes to the effects of fast charging and leaving it to charge overnight but I do know that my S6 battery (which was never great to begin with) became utterly terrible after about 16 months. I always used fast charging and regularly kept it plugged in overnight.

So for my S7e, I will only use fast charging when needed and avoid leaving it plugged in after it reaches 100%.

 

[jejb]

Wow. People still think charging your phone overnight wrecks the phone? Haven't we moved on from that yet?

I've charged every phone I've had overnight and that includes my Note 4 and S7E that both used fast charging. If I diminished my battery capacity by 5% or 10% in the 2 years I used the phone then that is fine with me. I sure as hell won't be nervously hovering over my phone ready to rip it off the charger the second it hits 100%.

Have to agree. I charged all of my Galaxy phones the same way, plug them when I go to bed and pull them off in the morning sometime. The only one that went through a batter is my wife's Note 4, but she's had it for years now (loves it and won't give it up!). The rest of them hit their 2 year mark with no noticeable degradation of the battery life. My S5 still functions well on the stock battery, I use it every now and then. However, I do turn off fast charging since I'm never in a hurry for it to charge.

 

[LeoRex]

I've read so many different opinions that I don't know what to believe

Don't believe anyone who tells you that leaving a fully charged phone on a charger does nothing... really. Anyone who says so is probably basing that on anecdotal evidence and not on real, lab tested and scientifically proven data.

 

[Daniel Barrett]

I might be mistaken but doesn't quick charging stop after 50% charge? After that it's normal charge speed, is it not? Also I have owned Samsung phones since I had my first phone, with the exception of one blackberry, and I don't go a night without charging my phone. Then I charge on my commute to work, and then on my wireless charger at work when I'm not using my phone. I like having my phone fully charged and I have never had an issue.

 

[pappcam]

I might be mistaken but doesn't quick charging stop after 50% charge? After that it's normal charge speed, is it not? Also I have owned Samsung phones since I had my first phone, with the exception of one blackberry, and I don't go a night without charging my phone. Then I charge on my commute to work, and then on my wireless charger at work when I'm not using my phone. I like having my phone fully charged and I have never had an issue.

I don't know of the exact percentage but yes, it doesn't fast charge all the way to 100% I believe.

You'd think that some people are actually afraid to use their phones because they don't want to wreck them by charging the battery. Even the mod here is in on that action.

I'm not sure how some people lives work where they can somehow remove the phone from the charger in the middle of the night when it hits 100%.

 

[recDNA]

best bet is to shut. phone off at night

 

[hellosailor]

"best bet is to shut. phone off at night"
Works great if you're a civil servant. Not such a good idea when you're the on-call guy and part of keeping your job is occasionally taking emergency calls in the dead of night. You might be surprised to know how many folks are *required* to be available 24x7, at least from time to time. Or even if you simply have family in another time zone, other mundane reasons why you may WANT to be accessible 24x7, at least to some folks.


You can't really make any absolute statements about chargers, because they are made in many very different ways. Sometimes a pulldown resistor is used in the cable to signal the phone that there is a particular device (the charger) attached. Sometimes the charger itself has the brains.

In the EU, there are rules about disconnecting chargers once a device is fully charged. So Samsung (idiots) tries to comply by making all of their devices wake up, light up, and chime when they are fully charged. As if I'm going to enjoy being awoken at 2AM to unplug my tablet?

But there are chargers which will stop the charge once the device has been charged (based on current drawn, I believe) and then turn back on based on different schemes. Heck, every laptop on the market probably offers the same thing, one battery charging mode that keeps the battery at 100% all the time, in case you need to bolt. And a second mode that typically allows the battery to float from 99% to 95% before it turns back on, allowing the battery to cycle fewer times for a longer service life.

There's no one solution that fits all but you can bet the $5 charger you buy at the gas station or online, is not going to have that kind of smarts.

And no matter what you do ("It was the best butter!" Lewis Carroll) a battery is still a consumable, disposable device. After two years it is time to replace it, because used or not, it has lost significant capacity. Which means time for a new phone, since the only way you know you're not buying a dangerous counterfeit is to buy it from the phone maker, and that's just too damn expensive.

 

[pappcam]

best bet is to shut. phone off at night

Lol. And there we have it. May as well extrapolate that out and say the best bet is to not use the phone at all because you could damage it or degrade it.

I use my phone as my night stand clock and alarm clock. I use it all day and I charge it overnight. I've always done it and I always will in the future.

 

[recDNA]

Not at all! I just mean charge it up and shut it off unless you answer email or phone calls after you go to bed.

 

[dlgus]

Verizon told me and my sister you're not supposed to leave your phone plugged in overnight. The rule of thumb is charge your phone to 80 % and deplete the phone to 20%. You're not really supposed to overcharge it because it destroys your battery faster.

That sounds like the old school charging advice I used to hear back in the old days.
Personally, in an era where phones cost an arm and a leg, and there is no option to remove/replace batteries, I find it hard to believe that Samsung would deliberately design a phone where the battery life would be significantly diminished by charging.
OTOH, I would not have believed the N7 debacle, had it not happened to me...