ISO new battery for an older phone

[Aflaaaak]

My 6 year old LG G4 batteries are only giving me around 1/2 a day with little usage. Can anyone recommend a place that sells good, legit batteries, that you have actual personal experience with their batteries? I have heard of everything from Sellers peddling old batteries, to "refurbs", to cheap knock-offs or ones that work for a couple months or ones that explode.
Thanks!

 

[Mooncatt]

Unfortunately, it's unlikely you'll find anything worthwhile at this point. Phone batteries are specific to each model, so LG would've stopped production of them not long after the phone ended its run. Third party manufacturers may go longer, but you never know what you'll get. Even they wouldn't produce batteries for a largely forgotten phone with a troubled history (the infamous boot loop debacle) this long. At this point, anything you buy would be a crap shoot. Even if you bought a well designed battery from a reputable seller, it'll be old stock and already degrading.

Unless you are willing to replace the phone, I only see 3 options, but each with tradeoffs.

-Buy several standard batteries. You may get lucky and one will still be well serviceable, but you're more likely to just swap them all out during the day. Additionally, buy a stand alone charger to charge them when not in use.

-Buy a larger battery. Even if it has reduced capacity, it may still be enough to get through the day. The downside is it makes the phone bulky and it still may not get you through the day depending on how bad it is. I.e. It may have the capacity you need, but enough internal resistance build up that you get excess voltage sag that shuts the phone down with a heavy workload.

-Buy a case with a built in battery, or external battery pack. These may use more standardized batteries that get you a fresher one (though the case batteries are still risky due to being an old design), but you then either get to deal with a bulky phone or tethered to a battery pack.

Personally, I wouldn't do either. As old as that phone is, it's just time to upgrade for multiple reasons. That would be my preferred route. If that's simply not possible, then I would just leave it as is and keep chargers and cables accessible to charge as needed (or go the large battery pack route if access to an outlet isn't possible).

 

[hallux]

Good luck. For a phone that old you're pretty much looking at "cheap knock-offs" as your only option. Any LG-branded batteries are likely going to be old stock, and of questionable life span.

I would consider saving that money and looking for a newer device in the near future.

 

[Aflaaaak]

I figured as much, thank you.
The bigger problem is that my 5 year old phone actually does everything I need it to do, except the company doesn't want to support it with replacement batteries. We live in an extremely wasteful, throw away world that is stripping the earth of resources while poisoning it with E-Waste. Up-Grade-itis is killing us... A very sad state indeed. :-[.

 

[Mooncatt]

I figured as much, thank you.
The bigger problem is that my 5 year old phone actually does everything I need it to do, except the company doesn't want to support it with replacement batteries. We live in an extremely wasteful, throw away world that is stripping the earth of resources while poisoning it with E-Waste. Up-Grade-itis is killing us... A very sad state indeed. :-[.

When you think about it, it's not the manufacturer's fault, but consumers always wanting to upgrade. For LG to continue making batteries for every phone that is rarely used anymore would actually be more wasteful than their current practice. It requires maintaining additional tooling, and lots of wasted batteries that are produced only to sit on a warehouse shelf for who knows how long until they recycle what they can and scrap the rest.

 

[Aflaaaak]

When you think about it, it's not the manufacturer's fault, but consumers always wanting to upgrade. For LG to continue making batteries for every phone that is rarely used anymore would actually be more wasteful than their current practice. It requires maintaining additional tooling, and lots of wasted batteries that are produced only to sit on a warehouse shelf for who knows how long until they recycle what they can and scrap the rest.

It's a Chicken or Egg thing. I personally don't need to upgrade, which is why I posed the question, and know a lot of folks that feel the same. There are plenty of people who do feel the need to upgrade when their phone's battery is toast. too bad we can't have both. The real driver is just plain profit. If all the manufacturers would wait at least a year or two before they upgrade any models, the demand would just wait patiently, but they feed us all this marketing snake oil that we NEED to upgrade so they can sell more handsets.