Have you noticed that the battery life of your Android smartphone has been declining more quickly than usual lately? The offender might have been found.
Reddit users on Android have been claiming that the Instagram app is to blame for the significant power drain they have been observing in recent weeks. When compared to other apps, Meta’s social media app seemed to be using a lot more battery life than it should given how frequently it is used.
Using a Samsung Galaxy A53, one Redditor observed that 49 minutes of WhatsApp screen time utilized just 2.4% of their battery capacity, compared to 12.4% for 54 minutes of Instagram screen time.
Now, Google has reportedly intervened to validate the suspicions of many. A Google community manager named Instagram as the source of battery drain on Android devices in an advisory article titled “Battery drain on Android devices” that was posted on the Android support website. The manager advised Android users to update their Instagram app right away.
As of this writing, the most recent version of the app (build 382.0.0.49.84) seems to fix the problem, so it’s definitely worth making sure you’ve downloaded it if you’ve been seeing your smartphone draining its battery more quickly than usual.
There are, of course, several additional methods to prolong the life of your battery. These include using Dark Mode or Power Saving, as well as putting unwanted apps to sleep (click to Settings > Battery > Background Usage Limits).
Check out our instructions below to keep your Android phone running as long as possible if you’re still experiencing power issues after the update (or if you don’t even use Instagram).
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Cristian Penisoara is a Guides Writer and Android specialist at Droid Tools. An Android user since version 2 and a professional event photographer, he combines technical curiosity with a detail-oriented approach - every guide he publishes is tested step-by-step on a real device before it goes live.
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