How do I check my phone’s battery health percentage — and what number means it is time for a new battery?

Your phone’s built-in battery health percentage tells a worn-out battery apart from a power-hungry app. Around 80% of original capacity is the usual point where a replacement starts making sense — here is where to find the number on iPhone, Google Pixel, and Samsung phones.

Your phone was at 40% at lunch and dead before dinner, and now you are wondering whether the battery itself is worn out or an app is misbehaving. Short answer: Check the built-in battery health number first — around 80% of original capacity is the usual point where a replacement starts making sense. That one percentage separates a tired battery from a software drain problem, so you do not pay for a new battery when deleting one hungry app would have fixed it.

Here is where to find the number on the major phones.1. On iPhone, read Maximum Capacity. Go to Settings > Battery > Battery Health & Charging.

On iPhone 15 and newer, Settings > General > About also shows the battery’s cycle count.2. On Google Pixel with Android 16, open Battery health. Go to Settings > Battery > Battery health to see the capacity percentage.3.

On Samsung, run the built-in diagnostics. Go to Settings > Device Care > Diagnostics > Battery status, or use the Samsung Members app’s interactive checks.4. Rule out a hungry app before blaming the battery.

Check Settings > Battery usage for one app using an outsized share in the background.5. Know the stop signs. If capacity is under about 80%, the phone feels hot, or the back is swelling, book a proper battery replacement — and if it is swollen, stop using the phone.Pro tip: Check the number once a month at most — it moves slowly, and heat hurts batteries more than an occasional charge to 100%.Ad’s take: Do not guess and do not let a shop guess for you.

That one percentage takes ten seconds to find and tells you whether you need a battery, an app cleanup, or just a better charger habit.