No, charging your iPhone overnight does not destroy the battery

Quality Quora answer sets the record straight

Some iPhone users have been confused as to how they charge the battery (Pixabay) (Pablo Blazquez Dominguez/Getty Images)

You may have heard that charging your iPhone overnight is bad for the battery.

According to Battery University, a website run by the company Cadex, charging your phone when its already fully charged keeps it in a high-stress, high-tension state, which wears down the chemistry within and does lasting damage.

Well ignore that.

In a brilliant and comprehensive Quora answer, tech author Jesse Hollington tells you everything you need to know about how your smartphone battery works: "Charging your iPhone overnight will not harm your battery in the slightest.

"Charging your iPhone from 90% will not harm your battery either. You simply can't overcharge an iPhone, or any other modern electronic device, for that matter.

"Any device that uses a Lithium Ion or Lithium Polymer battery must incorporate a charging circuit that cuts off charging power when the battery reaches 100%"

Basically the smartphone battery is as smart as the phone itself. Apple, Samsung and all the top tech companies - almost of whose products use lithium-based batteries - use this best practice.

And there's more: "Lithium Ion batteries are rated for a limited number of "charge cycles' (about 500 in the case of the iPhone), the term "charge cycle" refers to complete recharges, and partial recharges simply use up partial charge cycles.

"In other words, every time you charge your iPhone up from 90%, you're using 1/10th, or 10%, of a complete charge cycle.

"However, if you deliberately drain your battery to zero and then recharge it, instead of simply plugging it in when it needs to be charged, you're needlessly using up a complete charge cycle.

"Obviously if you're using your iPhone until the battery goes dead, that's fair, but there's no need to deliberately drain it before recharging it, and you'll actually shorten your battery life if you do so."

And there you go.