There are a number of tricks to save battery life and adjustments you can make to your BlackBerry that will increase performance and put less stress on your battery.

Here are some easy tips: 

• The Auto On/Off feature is designed to program the device to automatically power off and power on. On the Home screen, click the Options application. Select Auto On/Off to select the time the device will turn off and on.

• When wireless coverage is not needed, “Turn Wireless Off” to avoid unnecessary attempts by the radio to find coverage.

• For Bluetooth enabled BlackBerry devices, “Turn Bluetooth Off”, if it is not in use.

• BlackBerry devices should be kept in their holsters when not in use because this will turn off the LCD screen.

•  Don't use the backlight. This isn’t always an option, but if you have a version of the device that allows you to avoid using the backlight, then avoid it when you can. Your backlight eats up a huge amount of battery life.

•  Recharge often. Unlike some mobile batteries you don’t need to fully discharge the battery packs frequently. Several partial discharges with frequent recharges are better for lithium-ion batteries than one total discharge.

• Use BlackBerry shortcuts to access common system features quickly.

There are some other things you can do to optimize battery power. For example, if you are using BlackBerry Desktop Software, disable the forwarding option of messages to the BlackBerry when it is cradled. This will avoid duplication of e-mails to both the desktop computer as well as
the device, while you are working on the desktop computer. To do this go to your ‘Desktop Manager,’ click ‘Redirector Settings.’ Then select the ‘Disable e-mail redirection’ while your handheld is connected. Checkbox and click ‘OK.’ 

• Set the 'Wireless Email Reconciliation' option to 'Prompt' for deletions. This option allows you to delete e-mails locally to save space on the device without necessarily deleting the emails from the original mailbox. In the 'Messages' application, click the trackwheel and select 'Options' from the menu. In the 'Messages Options' screen, select 'Email Reconciliation' and change the 'Delete On' setting to 'Prompt.' Click 'Save.'

• For large messages, the 'More' and 'More All' features are available for up to 32KB of a message; however, these features should only be used when necessary. Disable the 'Auto More' function. In the 'Messages' application, click the trackwheel and select 'Options' from the menu. In the 'Messages Options' screen, click 'General Options' and change the 'Auto More' setting to 'No.'

• For BlackBerry devices running version 3.8 or 4.0 handheld software, disabling Content Protection and/or Content Compression will allow for improved system performance. However, using this option will eliminate additional security for stored data and will decrease file system space. From the handheld 'Home' screen,  click 'Options' and click 'Security' from the 'Options' screen. In the 'Security' screen, change the 'Content Protection' and the 'Content Compression' options to 'Disabled.'