What you need to know
- Google will launch a new battery preservation feature, Battery health assistance, later this year.
- The Google Pixel 9a is the only device currently confirmed to be getting the new feature.
- New devices will be required to use Battery health assistance, but it’ll be optional for existing ones.
Google’s Pixel 9a will hit shelves April 10, packing a significantly-larger battery capacity than its predecessor. However, that’s not the only battery upgrade the Pixel 9a brings along. The Google Pixel 9a will also receive with a new feature called “Battery health assistance,” as explained by a support document linked on its Google Store listing (via 9to5Google).
“Your Pixel 9a will receive a software update that automatically helps manage the long term health and performance of its battery as it ages,” the company explains. “This software will adjust the battery’s maximum voltage in stages that start at 200 charge cycles and continue gradually until 1000 charge cycles to help stabilize battery performance and aging.”
For those that are unfamiliar, Pixel phones — like most electronics — use lithium-ion batteries that are consumable components. That means they will degrade over time due to a number of factors, including temperature, charge cycles, and age. Eventually, all lithium-ion batteries will need to be replaced.
There are steps that can be taken to preserve the long-term health of your phone’s battery and overall performance, though. These can include intentionally throttling a device’s performance to accommodate battery degradation as it gets older, or limiting charge speeds and maximum charge levels. Battery health assistance will join the ranks of battery-preserving features in a later update, Google says.
“You may notice small decreases in your battery’s runtime as your battery ages,” the company writes. “Battery health assistance will also tune the phone’s charging speed based on adjusted capacity. You may notice a slight change in battery charging performance.”
For now, the Pixel 9a is the only device confirmed to get this feature when it launches later this year. However, it’s expected to come to more devices. These features aren’t user-customizable.
“Battery health assistance is a software feature that will roll out to a selection of Pixel devices starting later this year, designed to extend their usability,” Google told 9to5Google in a statement. The company also said Battery health assistance “will be voluntary for any customers using previously launched devices.”
This feature isn’t available now, and doesn’t have a set release date. Android 16 is expected to bring along a few other battery health tools for Pixels later this year.