App Review: Eco Charger

You know you’re supposed to unplug your phone when it’s done charging. Like any appliance, it keeps drawing energy as long as it’s plugged into the wall. But do you really notice when it’s done charging? And how often do you actually remember to unplug it?

Eco Charger is a simple app with a simple mission: It reminds you to unplug your phone once it’s fully charged. It will also let you know if you’ve got a problem with high voltage or an overheated battery, but for the most part, it’s there to stop you from needlessly overusing electricity.

Does what it’s meant to: As soon as I installed Eco Charger, it put itself to work. I didn’t have to open the app or do anything else. I plugged in my charger, and a short time later, I heard the audio notification letting me know that it was fully charged. And then, without so much as a pause, I heard it again. And again. I was across the room, in the middle of another task, but by the time five or six consecutive notifications had gone off, I had dropped what I was doing and run over to pull the plug. Eco Charger had definitely done its job. And yet….

It’s just a wee bit annoying: Granted, this isn’t the first time I’ve gotten annoyed by eco-friendly technology. In my home office, all the ceiling lights are compact fluorescent bulbs, and whenever I walk in there and flick on the lights at night, I groan in agony over how dim they are for the first five or ten minutes, as they slowly come to life. A truly devoted environmentalist would no doubt be glad to make such minor sacrifices. Be that as it may, the relentless audio notifications quickly turned me against the Eco Charger.

Check those settings: But there’s another twist to this tale! Just as I was about to uninstall the poor app, I realized that I hadn’t actually opened it to check the settings. And sure enough, it turns out that the audio notifications can be turned off altogether, or they can be set to go off just once, with no repeats. When you choose either of these settings, you still get a visual reminder in your notification bar—a little green leaf reminding you to unplug the phone. (Although this is arguably not much different from seeing your phone’s built-in notification showing a fully charged battery.) And you have the option for the phone to vibrate.

My recommendation: Eco Charger is a small app that doesn’t take up a lot of room on your phone, and if you turn off the relentlessly repeating notifications, it becomes very innocuous. Of course, if you’re only getting the one notification, you could easily miss it. I wouldn’t call this a must-have app, but if you’re trying to cut back on unnecessary electricity use, it certainly can’t hurt to give it a try.

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