Airplane Mode is built into almost all of our devices, ready to be turned on whenever we board a plane. It’s usually of limited use when you’re not flying (unless you really don’t want anyone calling you). After all, why would you purposely disconnect from the internet? Well, for a couple reasons, actually, when it comes to your Nintendo Switch: battery life and charging speed.

The Switch is a device that relies heavily on the internet. You need to be on wifi to download new updates, play online games, and stay in touch with your friends. That said, you probably won’t be doing that the majority of the time you’re using it. Unless you’re an online gamer, you’re more likely to be playing alone and playing something that you can easily play offline.

Connecting to the internet uses up battery life, but not just when you’re actively using it. It’s obvious that opening the eShop, installing updates, or joining an online match with a friend will use up battery, but there are plenty of other internet activities that are likely to use up more battery when your system is turned on.

Your Switch is constantly checking into your Wi-Fi, checking for new updates, seeing if your friends are logged in and what they’re playing, and sending you push notifications to let you buy new stuff. More importantly, it keeps doing all of these things even when it’s in sleep mode, meaning you’ll have a lot less battery life when you wake it up unless you keep it docked at all times. Simply turning on airplane mode when you know you won’t need the internet kills all of that processing.