Really bad Nexus 4 battery life

[ivang3]

hellos, im wanting to know your average battery life on your Nexus 4s. My friend and I both have one, yet his battery drains alot slower than mine. My battery drops about 10% for every 30 minutes during light browsing with everything disabled (sync, google now, facebook, GPS, WIFI) except HSPA and auto brightness. Battery Widget Reborn shows my battery dropping at 1% for every 1 min 50 seconds. Is this normal? ive had my nexus for alittle over 3 weeks now and im thinking of RMAing. Everything is stock

 

[mr_nobody]

Turn off auto brightness and set the brightness to the minimum you can accept.

 

[RumoredNow]

Has your friend implemented any settings or tweaks that you've not tried?

Has he modded the phone?

All things being equal in those respects... Is he in a better signal area? Switching between EDGE/3G/H+ frequently is notorious for robbing battery.

 

[greydarrah]

Welcome to the forum!

10% for every 30 minutes of screen time works out to about 5 hours. That's great battery life. I'd say about 3 hours of screen time is pretty average for any Android phone (and they are all about the same, despite the specific phone). You cannot compare your phone to anyone else's because everybody installs different apps and does different stuff with different settings on their phone. As an example, playing games or streaming video (2 of the most battery consuming things you can do) for 15 or 20 minutes is going to have a noticeable difference when compared to a phone that did not do that. One person might download a poorly written app that has a memory leak and slowly chews through your battery life. If you are getting 3 or more hours of screen time, there is nothing wrong with your phone and no need to RMA it.

 

[Rizy7]

Hmm, I dont think you have anything to worry about. Greydarrah gave you some excellent advice above. In fact, if you were to swap phones with your mate, you would probably find that the battery behaves very similar to the battery on your device while running the same set up you have.

 

[Andrew Stevenson]

Hi. I think I have an issue with both overheating and battery life! Used my N4 as Sat Nav today. 2 1/2 hour journey. Phone was plugged in to USB car charger. I noted that after about 30 mins the battery was no longer charging. The phone was very warm. It then started charging on and off for the next 90 minutes but by then the battery was at 10%. Fully charged it and same happened on journey home. WiFi was turned off and Navmii sat nav was only app running. Comments welcomed

 

[Rizy7]

Battery gets warmer while charging and you were using the sat nav. The sat nav was probably discharging the phone faster than the phone was charging.

 

[Andrew Stevenson]

Battery gets warmer while charging and you were using the sat nav. The sat nav was probably discharging the phone faster than the phone was charging.

Thanks for your comment. Had realised that was happening! Can't understand why charging would stop and start though. If all sat nav apps discharge the battery that quickly then they are only of use for short journeys and this can't be the case otherwise no one would pay for Tom Tom etc. Any suggested cures
s?

 

[greydarrah]

Thanks for your comment. Had realised that was happening! Can't understand why charging would stop and start though. If all sat nav apps discharge the battery that quickly then they are only of use for short journeys and this can't be the case otherwise no one would pay for Tom Tom etc. Any suggested cures
s?

I use a car charger from Motorola (Amazon.com: Motorola Vehicle Power Adapter micro-USB Rapid Rate Charger: Cell Phones & Accessories) called a rapid charger and I sometimes navigate for hours, in which case it fully charges my phone while I'm navigating. I have to say that I've never used the TomTom app though. Why not use the Google Navigation app? It works great (unless you're in a country that it doesn't cover) and it's free. I can tell you that my screen gets pretty warm when navigating for long periods of time (this happens with all phones I've owned). For longer trips, I just turn the screen off (but leave the navigation running) when I know I've got a hour or more to drive on the same road.

 

[HTCTundaBow]

I have been getting sub-par battery life since I got the phone. Last week I started using the charger my gf got with her MetroPCS phone, the LG Motion. My battery life is excellent now. Idk if the stock N4 charger has a defect or what, but it's night and day difference. I did notice, on my stock charger, that sometimes I would wake up in the morning, and as soon as I unplugged it from the charger, it would be at 96%

 

[RumoredNow]

I have been getting sub-par battery life since I got the phone. Last week I started using the charger my gf got with her MetroPCS phone, the LG Motion. My battery life is excellent now. Idk if the stock N4 charger has a defect or what, but it's night and day difference. I did notice, on my stock charger, that sometimes I would wake up in the morning, and as soon as I unplugged it from the charger, it would be at 96%

There is a trickle charge effect built in where the battery stops charging at 100%, falls back a bit and then slowly tops up to 100% again. It's meant to preserve overall battery life. If you are using a charger that delivers 100% power 100% of the time irregardless of the battery being topped off - that is not good for the battery in the long run and leads to a more rapid decay of capacity over time...

Heat is the enemy of battery capacity and longevity. Forcing current into a battery produces heat, just as discahrging does.

Here is a great source of info: How to Prolong Lithium-based Batteries - Battery University

 

[Jnorton2724]

I get about 2hr 30 mins of on screen time from 100% down to 10%. That's a mix of streaming music, watching videos, texting, searching the web and using apps.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Android Central Forums

 

[HTCTundaBow]

There is a trickle charge effect built in where the battery stops charging at 100%, falls back a bit and then slowly tops up to 100% again. It's meant to preserve overall battery life. If you are using a charger that delivers 100% power 100% of the time irregardless of the battery being topped off - that is not good for the battery in the long run and leads to a more rapid decay of capacity over time...

Heat is the enemy of battery capacity and longevity. Forcing current into a battery produces heat, just as discahrging does.

Here is a great source of info: How to Prolong Lithium-based Batteries - Battery University

I don't think that's the "problem with my charger. I have to plug it into several different outlets before it will start charging. Something is definitely wrong with my charger. It charges and discharges VERY fast when it's plugged in. Like a "flickering"

 

[RumoredNow]

I don't think that's the "problem with my charger. I have to plug it into several different outlets before it will start charging. Something is definitely wrong with my charger. It charges and discharges VERY fast when it's plugged in. Like a "flickering"

Uh yup. Sounds like a bad charger then. Still got warranty? I'd try and get a replacement free, or purchase one on Amazon...

 

[TheLegoman]

The phone controls the actual charging algorithm. Not the USB adapter. I used to have that issue when the phone would charge and stop charging perpetually, but I am not having any problems now. It definitely sounds like your charger is defective, so I would try to get a replacement. In general, I found the stock charger to be low quality and too weak to charge the phone properly. I would recommend purchasing a higher rated charger capable of pushing 2.1 amps to the phone. The stock one is 1.2 amps and is too weak to charge the phone while it is being used. I hope this helps.

 

[mcshaggin]

First full day of use. This is excellent compared to my EVO 4G. That included an hour, on my lunch break, of Netflix Weather bug app runs full time, and some browsing.

 

[startup8100]

I got about the same too. `~3 hrs of battery life on screen .

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

 

[ivang3]

Sorry for the late reply. Me and my friend both have battery widget reborn and his drops at about 1% every 4.5 minutes under similar load and no tweaks. We both use auto brightness and both phones are stock ROM and kernel. I've had the phone powered on for 1 hr 30 mins with 1 hour to OST. Battery is sitting at 60% now with just spotfy running in offline mode. And I tried using EDGE and dropping brightness and it seems to have made no difference. Coverage on hspa and edge are both at 3-4 bars wherever I go. Oh and one more thing... We both charged our phones when they were near 20% or so and we noticed that mine charges alot faster than his... Could this indicate a battery capacity issue? This is my battery use with 1:20 screen time if I uploaded correctly

 

[Rohit Singh1]

go for the RMA :-(

mine was a lot worse. During night time it used 35-40% of battery. The drainage was on the higher side.
First i thought it is due to Jelly bean update, but it surely had the problem. Now its ok.

 

[Scott Dill]

I just got a Nexus 4.

The battery life gave me less than 5 hours of talk time. I understand that it might not be exactly 15 hours but less than 5 is ridiculous.

I called Google and let them know this: 35% (talk time) of the 54% total used was due to talk time.

This come out to 19.6% of the battery was used by talking alone. 54 Minutes is what I used!!! Yeah, I didn't need a calculator to figure out this battery gives you less than 5 hours talk time. He even admitted they get returns ALL THE TIME for this EXACT PROBLEM.

Here is the hitch, if you return it they hit you for a 15% restocking fee!! He wanted to swap it and I asked if it restarted my 14 days. Answer is NO. The only way to not get stuck with a crappy phone is to return this, and get a full refund. Doing a swap out will put you well past the 14 days. Then you have a $390 dollar (w shipping handling/tax) paperweight.

The tech guy said it is luck of the draw and that a large percentage of these batteries are really bad......................I am sad, was looking forward to traveling in europe w an unlocked phone......now it seems I will have to drop 700 on the devilish iphone.......oh well.