People often think that when a phone’s battery starts acting up, it’s time for a new phone. But that’s not always the case. Instead, you may just need to calibrate your battery. Here’s why you should perform an Android battery calibration and how to do it.

Batteries will inevitably experience a decline in performance over time. It’s just simple physics: As ions flow between the anode and cathode of a battery, the cathode wears out. This even happens if you leave your phone in a drawer. And it’s true for all batteries, from your car to your phone.

However, this performance degradation is rarely as dramatic as your phone makes it out to be. You may see statements that batteries “only” last for 500 charge cycles, but as with any product, performance can vary from battery to battery, and even between individual batteries of the same type.

It also depends on your charging habits. If you charge your phone to 100% and then don’t use it that much, but let it discharge completely until it’s almost empty, then the battery life will be very different than a phone that you use all the time with the screen at full power.