If you attend or organize events, you know that phones seem to die quicker at events than in everyday use. You’ll find event attendees using any spare outlet they can find to keep their phone charged, but it’s very likely that only a handful of these people showed up to the event with their battery at 50% or lower. If attendees are showing up with a decent amount of battery life left, why are they leaving with a dead battery?
Screen Brightness
This may not be on event attendees’ minds, but a bright screen can drain their battery very quickly. If you’re hosting an outdoor event, many attendees turn up their brightness so they can scan a mobile ticket off of their phone and then never turn their brightness back down. They also might turn up their brightness the first time they try to check their phone or, if they have auto brightness turned on, their phone might boost them up to 100% brightness so they can see their screen.
Battery-Draining Apps
People are more likely to use social apps like Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat while attending events. In addition, if your event uses an in-event app, the constant checking of this app combined with the battery usage of location services can eat away at battery life. Many event planners and marketers encourage the use of social media or event apps before, during, and after their event. Unfortunately, these apps tend to be battery hogs and can kill battery life, especially if they’re being used simultaneously.
Background App Refresh
If you host conferences, trade shows, or any type of event that pushes real-time event information to attendees’ phones, this can chip away at your attendee’s battery. Even if your event-specific polling app isn’t open on their phone for the duration of the event, these apps tend to refresh frequently and use location data, taking a chunk of your battery with them.
Frequent Usage
This may sound obvious, but people tend to be on their phones more frequently at events than in their daily lives (think about it- if you were on your phone for 3-6 hours straight at your job, you probably wouldn’t have a job for very long). From taking pictures to taking notes and even checking the time, this constant, frequent usage does add up in the end.
High Usage Before and After Your Event
Attendees have to get to your event somehow, right? If they used GPS at all to get themselves to your venue, connected their phone to their car speakers via Bluetooth, listed to Spotify on the way over, used a rideshare app like Uber or Lyft, or spent their commute to your event scrolling through social media, they’ll likely arrive at your event with less battery life than when they started.
These are just a few reasons why smartphones die faster at events. While events themselves aren’t a Bermuda Triangle of battery life, they do promote smartphone usage that tends to be battery-draining. To help your attendees avoid having low-battery anxiety and navigate to and from your event safely, invest in charging stations! That way, your attendees can enjoy the event knowing that they’ll be able to walk out with enough battery life to keep them going well after your event has ended!
