Coming soon: a smartphone with a four-day battery life

Thanks to the smartphone’s status as the Swiss army knife of the average consumer’s digital life, battery life is fast becoming the number one feature that people look for when choosing a handset.Unfortunately, battery technology isn’t moving at the same pace as every other component in the latest generation of smartphones, meaning that, if anything, battery life is becoming comparatively shorter.

However, that might not be true for long. Researchers at the University of Stanford believe they have essentially created a new type of battery that could offer three times the life of today’s smartphone and tablet cells and have published their findings in the latest edition of science journal Nature.

At the moment the only way to double or triple a handset’s battery life while on the go is to invest in a case with an integrated second battery or to carry a standalone battery pack that can be plugged into the phone to top up the power when the battery’s about to die.