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Is there a way to disable GPS if not in use by any app – either provided by Android itself or, if that's not possible, by use of a third-party app?

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  • Always a good idea to check the /help/on-topic page of an SE site before posting :)
    – Izzy ♦
    Apr 9 '15 at 16:00
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    Forgive me my intrusiveness: I've just edited your question. Some of those "off-topic" questions can be turned into "perfectly fine on-topic questions" with just a little rephrasing as you see: Now it's no longer explicitely asking for an app – but for any solution to your (probably non-existing, as the answers show) issue :)
    – Izzy ♦
    Apr 9 '15 at 16:13
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GPS is automatically turned-off when not in use by apps. That said, apps can use GPS even if they work in background. So, I guess that your concern should be checking the apps that use GPS in the background, rather than turning it off completely.

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  • Thank you Aleksandar! So, just to confirm: I don't have to disable GPS on this tile statusbar overview screen in order to conserve energy? Instead GPS is not consuming energy as long as no app is making use of it, correct?
    – orschiro
    Mar 30 '15 at 7:59
  • That is correct.
    – Aleksandar Stefanović
    Mar 30 '15 at 12:20
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As Aleks pointed out, GPS only "drains battery" when accessed – its battery use in standby is negligible (see my answer here for some statistics). You can see whenever some app is accessing it, as then the cross-hair GPS icon appears in the notification bar.

However, some (badly coded) apps might be "hammering" GPS for location details. If you encounter such an app (but cannot live without that particular one), there are some tools which can take care for that (see e.g. our tag-wiki) – and e.g. turn GPS of as soon as that "waster" starts, or after a delay of say 1 min to allow it for one fix and not more.

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