Battery drain after using Nova Launcher

[Kunal Bhatia]

I recently themed my phone using Nova Launcher (did a fairly good job too) and it's a three screen layout with 7 widgets. Ever since I've installed it my battery drains far too quick. For example I charged my phone completely at 9pm last night before I went to bed and by 3 am my battery had completely drained. I have Juice Defender installed and also run a night schedule from 12 to 6am where all connectivity is off. Will attach screen shots later, but any solutions in the meanwhile. Pointless having an Android device if you cannot customize it.

 

[zkSharks]

For the most part, any solutions will depend on exactly what the battery drain is shown under. My quick guesses are as follows:

Widgets getting stuck in an improper update/sync/refresh cycle
An app/widget holding a wakelock on the device to keep it awake​

However in most cases these issues would have been addressed if the phone did power down as a result of a drained battery. I've never had poor battery life as a result of Nova Launcher in any way, so hopefully this is a one-off situation that can be addressed quickly.

 

[Kunal Bhatia]

Thanks Patrick. Have a look at these and give me your opinion.

 

[zkSharks]

I find it very surprising that the Android OS usage is so high. If you look at the lower graph, you can see that it says the phone was 'Awake' almost all of the time. This means that when the screen was off, the phone was prevented from entering its usual deep sleep state, and so battery usage remained much higher than it would have been. This is caused by a wakelock. I can't say for sure what's causing it, though.

Here's a bit about wakelocks that I wrote a few weeks ago:

A wakelock is something that an Android application or background service can register with Android. When one has been registered, it prevents the device from going to sleep. The highest-level wakelock keeps the screen on without dimming, for example while watching a YouTube video. These keep the device from going to sleep at all, and therefore are a significant battery drain. There are also lower-level wakelocks, such as ones that allow the screen and network connectivity to be turned off but keep the CPU on to do processing. They usually require significantly less power to maintain than the screen-on wakelocks, but still much more than the device uses while in deep sleep. These lower-level ones are harder to detect, because to the end user it appears almost the same as if the device is in its normal deep sleep state.

Perhaps someone else in the S3 forums can jump in with Android OS battery usage experience?

 

[Kunal Bhatia]

Thanks Patrick, just got BetterBatteryStats and read more on wakelocks. Tweaked the phone a bit and now hoping for the best.

 

[Kunal Bhatia]

After reading a lot about wakelocks and tweaking my phone settings, I ended up with this.

Big smile.

 

[badbrad17]

After reading a lot about wakelocks and tweaking my phone settings, I ended up with this.

http://i50.tinypic.com/2efmgiq.png

Big smile.

was it caused by that clock widget? That seemed high.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Android Central Forums

 

[Kunal Bhatia]

Yeah, got rid of that widget but still it was draining quite fast. Cause by wakelocks called AlarmManager for Google+. Persisted even after signing out of Google+. Then finally, I had to format my SD card and tweak some notification settings and boom.....battery lasts over a day now with moderate usage. JuiceDefender and BetterBatteryStats help a lot too.

 

[dark twister]

i have been facing problem of battery drain
for simple apps like kindle, whatsapp battery drains like anything with lowered brightness, wifi off, gps off, BT off
the steep drop in charge is due to kindle. Is it normal?

 

[GTWalling]

i have been facing problem of battery drain
for simple apps like kindle, whatsapp battery drains like anything with lowered brightness, wifi off, gps off, BT off
the steep drop in charge is due to kindle. Is it normal?

That is a yes and no. Kindle because you have the screen on using the battery. Your Screen ON time was 71%, there's your reason.

 

[dark twister]

i know
but i have brightness set at minimum. What is maximum screen on time for S3.
I saw people playing HD games , watching videos and still getting more than 6 Hrs of screen on time. (Based on web search)

 

[GTWalling]

I would say the "web search" was not correct. Anyone watching videos and playing games for 6 hours need a life. That said, most die hard gamers are usually connected to a charger or a different display where the connection charges at the same time. If you look at your battery stats every thing except the screen on i less than 10%. Your screen on time was a little over 4 hours. I can watch a 2 hour movie on the phone and my battery will drop like a rock by about 40%. If not watching a video I can get around 13-15 hours on a charge. The AMOLED screens are battery hogs.

 

[Steve Hock]

Sorry my lack of knowledge. How do you disable the wake lock

 

[timmy tim 84]

My battery life seems to have improved since installing nova. Which suprised me...