Techniques and apparatuses are described for adaptive phase-changing device power-saving operations. In aspects, a base station determines to transition an adaptive phase-changing device (APD) into an enabled APD-PS mode and determines an APD-PS configuration for the APD that specifies a framework for operating in the enabled APD-PS mode. The base station then directs the APD to operate in the enabled APD-PS mode by communicating the APD-PS configuration to the APD and transmits or receives wireless signals using a surface of the APD and based on the APD-PS configuration.