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iPhone 8/Plus Question on closing recent apps
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I generally don't close my recent apps (no need to really). Only app I would close on the recent would be Facebook and navigation app after I have used it. But all other apps I leave it alone, and I have no issues with battery drain.
You don’t need to. The only time I do is when an app freezes or breaks and I want to restart it.
Been leaving them alone for years, and it’s never a problem. It’s actually worse on your battery life if you obsessively close all of your apps constantly.
Been leaving them alone for years, and it’s never a problem. It’s actually worse on your battery life if you obsessively close all of your apps constantly.
It possibly uses more CPU power to keep opening them if you close them, and that will mean more battery drain, I leave mine open and never had an issue.
Adam.
Adam.
Some recent discussion in the second half of the thread at https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/ios12-swipe-up-to-close-open-apps.2138872/ might be of some help.
If you -never- clear up the app switcher by swiping them all away occasionally, you'll eventually end up with every app on the iPhone as a background card cluttering up the app switcher, making it almost worthless to use.
Clearing it up every once in a while by quitting all apps before shutting down is a good practice.
Does nobody restart their phone ever? The "uses more battery" argument is pretty weak. (and never rebooting the phone is poor computer practice)
Clearing it up every once in a while by quitting all apps before shutting down is a good practice.
Does nobody restart their phone ever? The "uses more battery" argument is pretty weak. (and never rebooting the phone is poor computer practice)
I'm like you... I don't need to see every app I've ever opened in the app-switcher. Isn't that why we have a bunch of icons on every homescreen?
So I close apps when I'm done with them. Especially momentary apps. Example: I'll check my weather app (Dark Sky) in the morning. Then I'm done with it until tomorrow.
I don't need to see Dark Sky in the app-switcher for the rest of the day. Or the rest of the week or month for other less-frequently used apps.
It has more to do with cleanliness for me. Maybe it's OCD.
But I'm definitely not concerned with using 0.0001% more battery to reopen an app tomorrow or beyond.
Honestly... watching 5 minutes of YouTube uses more battery power than opening 1,000 apps.
So while I understand that it uses "more" power to cold-open an app instead of unthawing it from a frozen state... I'm not worried about it.
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I wouldn’t say it hurts, but it does take longer to start an app that isn’t already in a suspended state. I do it whenever I’m having an issue with an app or the phone, but I never do it “just because”.
Do you have a Mac? Do you routinely open the Apple Menu, scroll to Recents and clear them? That’s basically the same thing people are doing on iOS. It’s mostly pointless except for very very few ill-behaved apps that stubbornly don’t suspend themselves as they should—like Facebook.
Overall not closing apps will provide a better user experience. For many (including myself) its tough to notice. And if you just like to keep the task switcher tidy than by all means go for it.
Things to know though, closing an app is actually "force closing". This action intentionally deletes an apps "preserve state" in case the app is problematic this allows it to start fresh. An apps preserve state varies but its why some apps go right to where you left them a month ago, or text fields you typed in haven't been deleted, etc. So its not like pressing the "Exit" in a computer application. Its more akin to Force Quit on Mac or using task manager to kill a program on windows. Devs program knowing people will do this and if the app is responsive will save critical data if it needs to prior to terminating.
Apps in the task switcher are in the background, while they a virtually closed they can be reopened by iOS depending on their use of background API's. For example, a push notification can reopen a 3rd party email app and download a new message into the app. If the app was force closed (can vary per app) you'll still get the notification that you have a new email but it wouldn't download until you opened the app (with a exception below).
Apps that are forced closed will not reopen like they do in the background with the exception of specific apps using the location background mode API. These apps can open and perform a task even if they are closed. Examples would be home automation apps to turn off security systems, lights, etc.
Of the 7-10 background modes Background Fetch aka Background App Refresh seems to cause the most confusion however in general its simple. When iOS feels it a good time based on location, time, network and your usage pattern various apps are given 30 seconds to update their content. So if you check an app every day when you get to work that supports background fetch it could be given permission to download data and integrate it into the app so its ready to go when you open it.
Apple has the background modes locked down fairly well making battery impact negligible for most people. Even background app refresh is strictly monitored and actively adjusted. Apps are given 30 seconds to download the data they need. integrate it into the app, and then required to tell iOS they are done. The longer they take or if they don't send completion handler at all the less likely and less often that app will be given permission to use background app refresh so that app can't kill the battery. This makes it a bit of a race it do what it needs and get done asap.
If you open and close the same app a lot through the course of the day it could effect battery life more then just leaving it in the background due to the processing and network power required to reload it all day vs it just updating some of its contents. Conversely if you use an app once a day or less closing it could won't effect much and in some cases save you battery.
Things to know though, closing an app is actually "force closing". This action intentionally deletes an apps "preserve state" in case the app is problematic this allows it to start fresh. An apps preserve state varies but its why some apps go right to where you left them a month ago, or text fields you typed in haven't been deleted, etc. So its not like pressing the "Exit" in a computer application. Its more akin to Force Quit on Mac or using task manager to kill a program on windows. Devs program knowing people will do this and if the app is responsive will save critical data if it needs to prior to terminating.
Apps in the task switcher are in the background, while they a virtually closed they can be reopened by iOS depending on their use of background API's. For example, a push notification can reopen a 3rd party email app and download a new message into the app. If the app was force closed (can vary per app) you'll still get the notification that you have a new email but it wouldn't download until you opened the app (with a exception below).
Apps that are forced closed will not reopen like they do in the background with the exception of specific apps using the location background mode API. These apps can open and perform a task even if they are closed. Examples would be home automation apps to turn off security systems, lights, etc.
Of the 7-10 background modes Background Fetch aka Background App Refresh seems to cause the most confusion however in general its simple. When iOS feels it a good time based on location, time, network and your usage pattern various apps are given 30 seconds to update their content. So if you check an app every day when you get to work that supports background fetch it could be given permission to download data and integrate it into the app so its ready to go when you open it.
Apple has the background modes locked down fairly well making battery impact negligible for most people. Even background app refresh is strictly monitored and actively adjusted. Apps are given 30 seconds to download the data they need. integrate it into the app, and then required to tell iOS they are done. The longer they take or if they don't send completion handler at all the less likely and less often that app will be given permission to use background app refresh so that app can't kill the battery. This makes it a bit of a race it do what it needs and get done asap.
If you open and close the same app a lot through the course of the day it could effect battery life more then just leaving it in the background due to the processing and network power required to reload it all day vs it just updating some of its contents. Conversely if you use an app once a day or less closing it could won't effect much and in some cases save you battery.
@cynics
So what is going on with the app switcher when the phone gets rebooted and all of those "app cards" are reloaded again? Clearly all those apps aren't reloaded then suspended at startup. I'm thinking they're just screenshots that have zero capabilities in the background. Just worthless placeholders. Correct?
So what is going on with the app switcher when the phone gets rebooted and all of those "app cards" are reloaded again? Clearly all those apps aren't reloaded then suspended at startup. I'm thinking they're just screenshots that have zero capabilities in the background. Just worthless placeholders. Correct?
You don't really need to close applications on a modern iPhone. I agree with most of the replies you're getting.
The only one that I'll close out myself is Facebook and anything owned by Facebook because they don't behave themselves.
Most of the time, it takes more energy to load an application than if you're just left it loaded in memory anyway. So it's not like you're saving battery or anything (except for Facebook).
iOS is intelligent enough to make room in memory when it needs to do it.
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No, they're really in memory most of the time, and might or might not be doing something depending on how you've set them up to use background refresh. Facebook will sometimes just do what it wants, though, regardless of how you've set it up.
I do not close them constantly but usually at the end of the day or the beginning of the next. Do no buy the “it uses more power to reload the app”. That would be negligible. Just like to keep it clean and tidy.
I close them after I am done with them. It's an OCD thing for me. I've I'm in the app switcher I only want apps I'm currently using in there. For example, if I'm flying I'll leave the clock app open (can see that tiny time in the upper left without my glasses easily) and a few games. Otherwise I close them.
Finds no need to do so as my Mac runs BootCamp with Win10 Pro 95% of the time. On,y boot into MacOS for an occasional update.
Not at all in fact.
Think of it this way, as long as an app is in the task switcher it can perform background task regardless of standard situation including a reboot, app crash, etc.
RAM and/or the state of app (suspended, running, etc) aren't relevant to what iOS will allow the app to do in the background.
