How to stay connected when the power's out

Conserve battery from minute one

Don't wait until 20%. Lower screen brightness, turn on low-power mode, close background apps, and switch on Wi-Fi/Bluetooth only when needed. If cell signal is weak, the phone burns battery hunting for a tower — airplane mode when you don't need connectivity dramatically extends runtime.

Charge without wall power

A charged power bank is the simplest backup — keep one charged for storm season. A car charger works (run the engine outdoors, never in a closed garage — CO). Laptops, and increasingly portable power stations, can top off a phone many times; see choosing home backup power.

Text instead of calling

Per the FCC, during and after a disaster networks get congested — text messages often get through when calls won't, and they use less power and network capacity. Keep calls short and for emergencies, and try again if a call fails rather than repeatedly redialing.

Wireless Emergency Alerts and NWS

Most phones receive Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) — the short government messages for extreme weather, evacuation, and AMBER alerts — with no app and no signup; check they're enabled in your phone's notification settings. A battery or hand-crank NOAA weather radio is the reliable backstop when cell networks fail.

Your home internet and cordless phones are down too

An outage kills your Wi-Fi router and any cordless landline (the base needs power). A traditional corded landline may still work. Cell towers have backup batteries but not unlimited runtime, so service can degrade in a long, wide outage. 911 still works from any cell phone with any carrier's signal, even a phone with no active plan.

Let alerts do the watching

Instead of repeatedly refreshing to see if power's back, set a free outage alert for your address — one browser tap, no signup — and save your battery for what matters.