Anyone else find it ridiculous that you have to turn off wifi location svcs to not kill the battery

[Paul Meeks]

Just got a S4 and have found 1000 complaints about wifi-location services killing batteries when I went to find out why my brand new phones battery only lasted 5 hours and google services sucked up 70% of the battery. Shut them off an now I get a full day out of it, WTF? That's a pretty handy feature you need to kill off to make the phone usable. I now understand why people love iPhones so much.

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! I have found that the main culprit is Location Reporting, which is only a subset of Location Services. Location Reporting is used so that other people can know where you are (in Google+, and in the old Google Latitude app). Personally, I don't really want everyone to know exactly where I am, so I turn it off. When I did that, my battery's rate of drain dropped by about 1/3. Turning off Location Reporting had no effect on any app's ability to access my location in order to give me proper information (e.g., weather, Google Now info, etc.).

And by the way, I've heard plenty of complaints from iPhone users (including my wife) about battery life and the need to charge before the day is over.

 

[Somdk]

Absolutely. Even though on different handset than S4, a Note 2 and a Galaxy S, keeping the location setting off did give me better battery life. Also when I am on mobile data I have the Restrict Background Process ticked. : )

Sent using AC Forums mobile app

 

[garublador]

And by the way, I've heard plenty of complaints from iPhone users (including my wife) about battery life and the need to charge before the day is over.

If you do a Google search you'll find a lot about Google Now having a pretty major effect on iPhone battery life as well.

I'll second that after the most recent update I easily get a full day out of my S4 with all Google Now cards on and with location history on (I also have AutoLocation based geofence profiles set up in Tasker, but I think that's battery neutral if Now is also running) but Location reporting off. It's way better now than it was before the update. I haven't tried it lately with Location reporting on, but I don't want that feature so I haven't had a reason to try it. Right now I've had my phone on for 4.5 hours, I have 23 minutes of screen time and I'm at 88%.

 

[jeffreii]

Just got a S4 and have found 1000 complaints about wifi-location services killing batteries when I went to find out why my brand new phones battery only lasted 5 hours and google services sucked up 70% of the battery. Shut them off an now I get a full day out of it, WTF? That's a pretty handy feature you need to kill off to make the phone usable. I now understand why people love iPhones so much.

If your phone died after 5 hours and 70% of the battery use was Google Services, you have a much bigger problem than wifi location service. You need to reinstall Google Services probably, because something is wrong. If that doesn't work, you might even have to factory reset your device.

I found that Google Services (specifically Nlpwakelock) was keeping my phone awake about 1-2 hours per day. That was a bit alarming, but it was only accounting for about 5% battery drain each day. Not a big deal at all. I disabled the "use wireless networks" in location services and that wakelock is entirely gone. Google Services now barely uses any of my battery. I'm probably going to re-enable it, though, because 5% per day is hardly anything to me and I do like the feature of getting my location through wireless when GPS isn't available.

Anyways, THAT is a normal scenario. Yours is not.

PS: Ending your post with "I now understand why people love iPhones so much." makes you sound like an ***, since you're doing it on AndroidCentral...and you're saying it because you failed to recognize that you have an exceptional problem with your phone that is not the same as what the other "1000 complaints" are about.

 

[Dramer77]

google needs to get that under control, i love how AC made a post and tried to act like theres nothing wrong and it suppose ot be this way... BS.. i disabled wifi/mobile data under location setting because google services uses so much battery while the phone is at idle on wifi... and his statement doesnt make him look like an *******.. nothing wrong with liking things that dont have these kinds of issues..

 

[garublador]

google needs to get that under control, i love how AC made a post and tried to act like theres nothing wrong and it suppose ot be this way... BS.. i disabled wifi/mobile data under location setting because google services uses so much battery while the phone is at idle on wifi... and his statement doesnt make him look like an *******.. nothing wrong with liking things that dont have these kinds of issues..

It is supposed to be that way. If you want the features that use your location to work when your phone is idle then you have to expect that it will use some battery. Google has made major improvements in how much battery is used since the S4 came out (about cut it in half by my estimation). You see the exact same thing on an iPhone if you enable the exact same features. They're all features that are easy to disable as well.

 

[androidalais]

Just got a S4 and have found 1000 complaints about wifi-location services killing batteries when I went to find out why my brand new phones battery only lasted 5 hours and google services sucked up 70% of the battery. Shut them off an now I get a full day out of it, WTF? That's a pretty handy feature you need to kill off to make the phone usable. I now understand why people love iPhones so much.

Yeah. I have an iPhone and just listening to music between classes and sometime in class my battery is drained by the end of school. It's not an s4 problem, it's a smartphone problem. Smartphones use more power than we can fit into a tiny battery.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk - now Free

 

[rfortson]

This is the first smartphone I've owned that easily lasts all day on a single charge. I don't have anything turned off, and just haven't seen these problems. I guess I'm lucky. Yes, I realize everyone's usage is different, but I find the battery life fine. I'd say that the OP's specific phone is having issues.

 

[Haalcyon]

I gladly keep it off unless I need it (which is pretty much never). Doing so has noticeably lengthened my battery life on both my S4 and Note 8.

Sent from my humble Note 8.0 LTE

 

[Dramer77]

It is supposed to be that way. If you want the features that use your location to work when your phone is idle then you have to expect that it will use some battery. Google has made major improvements in how much battery is used since the S4 came out (about cut it in half by my estimation). You see the exact same thing on an iPhone if you enable the exact same features. They're all features that are easy to disable as well.

no its not... it drains more on wifi than anything else... when my phone is sitting in my house idle for hours google services shouldnt use over 60% of the battery thats been used.. it never did that before the latest updates

 

[garublador]

no its not... it drains more on wifi than anything else... when my phone is sitting in my house idle for hours google services shouldnt use over 60% of the battery thats been used.. it never did that before the latest updates

It depends on how long it lasts. With the latest update and all Google Now cards, WiFi on and location services on I lose about 2% per hour while idle. That's 50 hours of standby time. If you're losing more than that I agree that something is up, but it doesn't seem isolated to Google location services and WiFi.

 

[Dramer77]

It depends on how long it lasts. With the latest update and all Google Now cards, WiFi on and location services on I lose about 2% per hour while idle. That's 50 hours of standby time. If you're losing more than that I agree that something is up, but it doesn't seem isolated to Google location services and WiFi.

when i turn on wifi/mobile data google services uses way more battery at idle than any other time.. on xda theys narrowed it down and figured out what it is , something to do with wake lock

 

[mchockeyvette27]

Yeah. I have an iPhone and just listening to music between classes and sometime in class my battery is drained by the end of school. It's not an s4 problem, it's a smartphone problem. Smartphones use more power than we can fit into a tiny battery.


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Amen.

Posted via Android Central App

 

[anon(146480)]

Great thread! I turned off location reporting and I've more than doubled my battery usage. Thanks!

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[tippmann15]

If my iPhone 5 had decent battery life, I wouldn't have had to add a gs4 to my daily usage. Looking back I'm not sure how I ever put up with the iPhone's battery. Cool phone, not so good for my daily driver.

GS4/iPhone5

 

[mcefalu]

Where is Location Reporting located in the settings?