Worst battery killing apps exposed

Cape Town – A survey has named the worst performing apps that drain smartphones' battery lives.

According to a survey by AVG, Snapchat was identified as the worst performing mobile application because of its drain on resources.

“Did you know that while it runs, it makes use of the camera, Wi-Fi/mobile data and GPS functionality, simultaneously? This explains the high battery life and traffic consumption,” said AVG performance expert Sandro Villinger.

While social media apps feature as drains on battery as well heavy data consumers, Facebook’s Pages Manager ranked as the top sinner app that runs on start-up.

“The app stores a lot of local content as it tracks page statistics, followers and comments while on the move,” said Villinger.

Internet browsers are also resource hogs, says the report and often run in the background on mobile phones.

Villinger suggested that regular cleaning may free up resources.

“Clean up your browser from the settings menu or use a thorough cleaner product.”

Here are the top draining apps that run on start-up:

1. Facebook
2. Google Play Services
3. Facebook Pages Manager
4. BBM
5. Words with Friends
6. Messenger
7. ooVoo Video Call Text and Voice
8. ChatON Voice & Video Chat
9. The Weather Channel

Here are the top draining user started apps:

1. Snapchat
2. Amazon Shopping UK
3. Spotify Music
4. LINE: Free Calls and Messages
5. Samsung WatchON (Video)
6. Netflix
7. Clean Master (Boost & App Lock)
8. Amazon Kindle
9. Amazon Shopping (Global)
10. BBC News

Applications that stream content such as Spotify may also take up extra memory space on mobile devices though social media consumption apps can also consume data even when they are not being used.

Watchdog Lite is able to alert mobile users about misbehaving applications and using Facebook Lite or the browser may save users’ data bundle.

To limit data consumption on Android phones, go to Settings -> Wireless/ Networks -> Data usage. Tap the "Restrict background data" setting.

On iPhones, you can go to Settings -> General -> Restrictions. Here you can set which apps are able to run in the background.

Many new smartphones ship with memory cleaners built into the operating system that can be set to clear RAM and cached files that take up memory and resources.

Which apps do you find to gobble your smartphone resources? Let us know.

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