Embodiments of user equipment (UE) and methods for application-agnostic discontinuous reception (DRX) triggering are generally described herein. In some embodiments, a UE is configured to monitor buffer status history and traffic activity history, and trigger DRX mode activation based on the buffer status and the traffic activity history. In some embodiments, the UE may determine a probability, based on the buffer status history and the traffic activity history, that a level of traffic activity that cannot be handled during DRX mode would occur. In these embodiments, the UE may trigger DRX mode activation when the probability is below a threshold.