Best Android Phone for Long Battery Life article

[xxBrun0xx]

Regarding Daniel's recent article on battery life:
Best Android Phone For Long Battery Life | Android Central

What are these recommendations based on? The Moto Z Play is on a different planet than the S7 edge, Mate 9, and Honor 8. Here's the general consensus (some from your own forums/articles):

S7 Edge (~4 hours SOT over 1 day): Best Android Phone For Long Battery Life | Android Central
Honor 8 (5-6 hours SOT over 1 day): 5 things I learned traveling with the Honor 8 | Android Central
Mate 9 (5-7 hours SOT over 1 day): Huawei Mate 9 & Porsche Design Mate 9 review - Android Authority

Moto Z Play w/ no battery pack (+14 hours SOT over 2 days, +7 hours SOT over 3 days): http://forums.androidcentral.com/mo...-edition/724299-moto-z-play-battery-life.html

See the difference? The Snapdragon 625 is an animal and if you haven't used a phone with one, you really should. I got rid of my OP3 to get a Z Play, don't think I'll ever go back to a Snapdragon 800-series CPU. I've currently got 44% after 5 hours SOT and I didn't charge my phone last night or the night before. Would love to see a Mate 9 do that.

Only reason I can think of for you putting any of the phones you did on that list is this line at the end of the article:
"This post may contain affiliate links."

I've been reading AC every day for years, so I hope I'm wrong about this and the article can be fixed.

 

[Daniel Bader]

This is an overall recommendation that weighs battery more heavily than anything else, but it's still a holistic overview of the category. Which means that the phone fundamentals are what we look at with respect to the battery, and while the Moto Z Play has amazing battery life, it's not as good a phone overall as the Mate 9, nor the Galaxy S7 edge, and therefore doesn't win overall.

The recommendations are not chosen by me personally; they are debated internally and polled externally, and don't rely just on benchmarks. If we did that, we'd be choosing the phone with the physically biggest battery every time without taking into account other aspects of the device's performance or experience, and that wouldn't be fair to people looking for a great phone.

The affiliate links have nothing to do with our recommendations, I assure you that. In fact, many of our top devices have no affiliate ties at all, since we send people to the retailer with the best experience and probability of having stock. Sometimes that's Amazon, where we make some money from a sale, but it could just as likely be OnePlus or Samsung itself, where we make nothing.

Hope that clears things up a little. Thanks for the question!

 

[xxBrun0xx]

It does, I really appreciate the response! By reading the title and looking at the choices, one would think #1 has the best battery life of any modern phone, followed by #2 , then #3 , etc. This is absolutely not the case, but instead this appears to be your favorite phones of the moment + a phone with good battery life (the Z play) thrown in at the end for good measure. It sounds like you haven't tried the Z Play, but you really should. Will change what you expect from a smartphone.

 

[Daniel Bader]

It does, I really appreciate the response! By reading the title and looking at the choices, one would think #1 has the best battery life of any modern phone, followed by #2 , then #3 , etc. This is absolutely not the case, but instead this appears to be your favorite phones of the moment + a phone with good battery life (the Z play) thrown in at the end for good measure. It sounds like you haven't tried the Z Play, but you really should. Will change what you expect from a smartphone.

Hey again,

I actually reviewed the Moto Z Play for AC, so I am definitely familiar (and enamored) with the phone. I understand your concerns, but we feel that the Huawei Mate 9 is a better phone for most people. As I said, the results are not an apples-to-apples battery benchmark — we don't do that here— but a more holistic look at the devices with an emphasis on battery.

 

[finbaar]

I think for a phone to be in this list then it has to be a good phone period. The Z Play just isn't as good as the other phones on that list BUT it does have better battery life. Maybe the article should be titled "The best phones for battery life with no compromise".

Anyway, in the UK we can buy the Lenovo P2 for £200 unlocked, now that is the beast of a phone for battery life - SD 625, Amoled screen, and a 5.1 Ah battery in a 8.3mm thick metal body with no clip on backs. Looks like Lenovorola are the firm if you need a phone to last and last.