I've got an older Nexus, and it noticeably strains whenever there's some sort of network event going on - signing onto wifi, coming within range of known wifi, re-gaining a network connection - I suspect it's all the apps trying to desperately play catch-up ("MUST UPDATE MAPS!")
I wish I had a way to toggle selective-airplane-mode. That is, only the current app gets to know that I'm connected - Slack, Twitter, Google Maps all get to quietly run in the background and do nothing.
Check to see if your phone has a power saving mode that limits the background activity of apps. If you're only concerned with how the foreground app is functioning, then this would probably work perfectly for you.
Also within the settings, you can select what to do with apps that are pushed to the background. It'll be under the developer settings.
I wish I had a way to toggle selective-airplane-mode. That is, only the current app gets to know that I'm connected - Slack, Twitter, Google Maps all get to quietly run in the background and do nothing.