DO NOT BUY the Pixel 4 if you care at all about battery life!!!

[merlin29]

Being a BlackBerry user for years, thought I would give Android a try again as last one was an original Nexus, the pixel 4 looked good and things must have advanced, went for pixel 4 as it’s a fairly compact phone, it’s a 64GB in white does not show finger marks and feels good in the hand and is well built,
Only had it a few days so can’t comment on battery life yet it should improve with time when it has optimised battery use and settled down, camera is excellent to me as a BlackBerry owner as they never had very good cameras, face unlocking works every time with or without reading glasses and is quick, some reviewer said it went straight to home screen missing the lock screen there is a toggle to choose which option you want, screen is very good and bright enough for me, cellular and Wi Fi reception is excellent, software update out of the box including November security one, the assistant is new to me and very impressed with being able to continue with another question without saying hey Google or Siri as my Granddaughters I phone has to,
Have switched off always on display and wellbeing not needed, and the pure Android with no bloat ware is a pleasure to use and the regular security updates are good to have, if the battery life is not up to my usage I am not giving up my pixel because of that will carry a small power bank a simple solution, still going through Android 10 and learning all of its features Hopefully it will last a year or two if I don’t break it, with all the negative reviews do I have buyers remorse not at all.

 

[DJM626]

I too came from being a BB user for many years until I got my the first pixel that came out (Non XL). Fast forward to today. Purchased Pixel 4 last weekend. First few days I saw a big fluctuation in battery life. I had a few days of a little over 5 hours of SOT. Few days later it dropped to about 4 hours. For the past several days I have been getting about 5-5.5 hours of SOT. I don't keep my display on all the time, I am only at about 50% brightness and have not used motion sense regular. Only tried it out briefly. Maybe once more things are implemented with it I will use it a little more. I have about 100 apps on my phone and have battery usage restricted for about 85 of them. Have always been like that on all my phones. Same thing with data too. Even though I have unlimited, I choose not to let my apps use data in the background if they are not running. Not a power user but yet not super conservative with my use.

I use Wi-Fi all of the time when I am at home. My signal at work is kind of spotty as we are not allowed to use Wi-Fi at work for personal use. I would imagine with my phone constantly searching for a signal at work that I am going to be burning up a little more battery. So far, in a week, no buyers remorse at all. I like the adaptive battery but think it would have been a lot better if there was a bigger battery to begin with, but am still over all more than satisfied for my phone usage. I also have a Anker Power bank that I use but mostly when going out as I like to take a lot of photos. Never had to use it for running out of power on a day to day basis. Only use it when I know I am going to be snapping a lot of pics.

Hopefully with the Pixel 5 release, Google will have learned from these issues, especially since all of the phones out there are utilizing bigger batteries. Read that Motorola bumped up their battery quite a bit, Galaxy 11 next year is rumored to have significantly increased their battery size as well. Hopefully Google will take those same measures for their next release. Especially if it is going to be a 5G phone. I am sure it is going to consume more battery.

This phone was the perfect replacement to my original pixel which had to be charged about 4 or 5 times daily since the battery was old. If this carries me through to the next pixel release, I will be totally happy. If not, I only owe a few hundred more on it and I can keep looking until something else satisfies me

 

[DJM626]

Currently at 5hrs 38 minutes with 20% battery life left. Only thing I did notice yesterday morning was when I left my house for work, I had 100% but did not power up my phone until I got to the office. In a 25 minute drive with the phone completely off, I lost 6% by the time I got there. If this is a known issue with Google maybe their will be a patch in place in the future that would give back some of that lost percentage

 

[wyelkins]

Yeah. Ok. It's the 4XL

 

[DJM626]

You might see an increase in battery life if you restrict the battery for all of the apps that you don't use too frequently. I am on the Pixel 4 non XL and by restricting battery for everything I do not use frequently enough, I only allow I for about 10 -20 of my everyday apps that I use. Just a thought. Seems like the more apps I restricted battery for, the better battery life I am getting. Didn't think it was possible to get SOT of 6 hours on the smaller pixel 4, but it definitely is, and I am using it pretty normally

 

[srgonu]

Pixel 4 (not XL) battery after 2 weeks

https://youtu.be/bYPKDzlpVnc

 

[kolyan2k]

By looking at all the screenshots of XL, I can say that its definitely enough for the day, but still less then small Note 10 with smaller battery (200mah less)

 

[bhatech]

By looking at all the screenshots of XL, I can say that its definitely enough for the day, but still less then small Note 10 with smaller battery (200mah less)

As someone who used both Note 10 small and 4 XL, the 4 XL has better battery than the smaller Note 10 for me. How did you definitely say it has better battery? By looking at SoT times ?

The bigger Note 10+, iPhone 11 pro that's a different story and they all have better battery than 4 XL and I say that by experience of using them as well.

 

[kolyan2k]

As someone who used both Note 10 small and 4 XL, the 4 XL has better battery than the smaller Note 10 for me. How did you definitely say it has better battery? By looking at SoT times ?

The bigger Note 10+, iPhone 11 pro that's a different story and they all have better battery than 4 XL and I say that by experience of using them as well.

Yes by looking at SOT. I get about 7 hour of SOT, 16+ hours of standby, and still have 17-20% left on battery. This is without even trying to save battery. Auto brightness, Bluetooth, wifi, lte, GPS, 2 account sync, messengers etc. All running.

 

[bhatech]

Yes by looking at SOT. I get about 7 hour of SOT, 16+ hours of standby, and still have 17% left on battery. This is without even trying to save battery. Bluetooth, wifi, lte, GPS, 2 account sync, messengers etc. All running.

The key point is you get 7 hrs and you don't own the pixel 4 XL .. so it's a moot point about you saying smaller Note 10 gets better battery when you can't compare your usage directly with your smaller Note 10

Also, SoT mean nothing. I never ever have got 7 hr SoT on any Android phone I have owned till now. And expect the Huawei phones which aren't available in the US, I have owned and used pretty much every flagship.

And I don't dumb down my phones as well, and I have everything running on my phone all the time.

 

[kolyan2k]

The key point is you get 7 hrs and you don't own the pixel 4 XL .. so it's a moot point about you saying smaller Note 10 gets better battery when you can't compare your usage directly with your smaller Note 10

Also, SoT mean nothing. I never ever have got 7 hr SoT on any Android phone I have owned till now. And expect the Huawei phones which aren't available in the US, I have owned and used pretty much every flagship.

And I don't dumb down my phones as well, and I have everything running on my phone all the time.

That's why I said, I compared by looking at screenshots. That's how you compare. I cant possibly buy all phones on the market
Ps. SoT means alot. It's the biggest contributor to the battery drain. Standby phones can last many days

 

[bhatech]

That's why I said, I compared by looking at screenshots. That's how you compare. I cant possibly buy all phones on the market

I understand but just pointing out you can't conclude battery life of one phone is better/worse than other by looking at screenshot of someone else's like how you concluded. I'm in the Note 10 forum as well and could possibly point out many battery stats of smaller Note 10 which are less SoT then some of the screenshots posted here or compared to other phones. They mean nothing unless you compare with your own usage stats.

 

[wyelkins]

4XL still improving

 

[Worshipper]

I mean this as respectfully as possible but reading through this forum sounds like those that purchased this phone are trying to vehemently justify not making a mistake due to battery life. The battery in the pixel 4 and 4xl are too small for the above average user to get through the day. That is a fact. Google messed up and its pretty clear that one department wasn't talking to the other when they made this phone. I would hate to see what battery life is like after 6 to 12 months of normal degradation.

 

[mustang7757]

I mean this as respectfully as possible but reading through this forum sounds like those that purchased this phone are trying to vehemently justify not making a mistake due to battery life. The battery in the pixel 4 and 4xl are too small for the above average user to get through the day. That is a fact. Google messed up and its pretty clear that one department wasn't talking to the other when they made this phone. I would hate to see what battery life is like after 6 to 12 months of normal degradation.

According to the user that have them, not seeing battery issue despite being on the smaller side.

 

[the_boon]

First off, let me start by saying that I've been a long time Nexus/Pixel user. I've had every Nexus device since the Nexus 4, and the last Pixel device I had was the Pixel 3a (after a brief stint with the Pixel 3). Despite hesitations about this phone with its small battery, I was taunted by the alleged camera quality and bought the Pixel 4. Again, keep in mind, I'm only talking about the Pixel 4 here and not the XL version.

First let me quickly talk about the good. The phone feels great in the hands and the display is very sharp indeed! The gestures are a total gimmick and frankly other than waving to the next song, I don't know what else it could even be used for. Face unlock WORKS and it's fast! but honestly I still prefer the fingerprint reader in the back especially since I used to use it all the time to pull down the notification bar and totally miss it. Just for kicks, I did try that face unlock with eyes or one eye close and it's true, it does still unlock.. but who cares.. I'm not concerned about it being a security issue.

With that said.. the phone is going back! I can't stand the battery life on this.. It can't even get me through a moderate day. I can safely say, this is THE WORST Pixel phone ever when it comes to battery life. I'm not stupid about battery life.. I've tried to optimize things and have alwaysOn display turned off and even usually run it on battery saver mode but no matter what I do, can't really manage to squeeze more than 3 hrs of SOT of this phone and the standby battery life is also pretty bad.. not sure if it's that near Soli radar constantly beaming or what. I just CAN'T believe in 2019-2020.. while Apple has phones out with the best battery life ever, Google puts out this??? Did they even bother testing it?? WTF?? Getting 2.5 hrs of screen on battery life is just not acceptable! And frankly, I can't even tell the camera is all that much better compared to what I had on the 3a. Will wait for the 4a and hope they don't screw that one up also.

The instant I read that this thing was gonna pack a 2800mAh cell, I knew it was doomed.

Good decision you made to send it back.

I think the best Pixel for battery is gonna have to be the 3a XL, logically.

The 3a should be much better with that power sipping processor and an extra 300mAh compared to the 4.

 

[vzwuser76]

I mean this as respectfully as possible but reading through this forum sounds like those that purchased this phone are trying to vehemently justify not making a mistake due to battery life. The battery in the pixel 4 and 4xl are too small for the above average user to get through the day. That is a fact. Google messed up and its pretty clear that one department wasn't talking to the other when they made this phone. I would hate to see what battery life is like after 6 to 12 months of normal degradation.

I say this respectfully as well, but it incenses me when people dismiss other people's experiences or motives as justification for a bad decision. Sure, people want to believe that they didn't make a bad decision. But, it's not like they would have to keep the phone and live with it either. There's a return period, and past that they can sell it or trade it in on another device. If people are getting the SOTs they are, I'd say it's less of a justification and more of a relief to them and also wanting to push back against the negative feelings many have towards the device.

Do I think Google should've put a larger battery in? Yes, but I believe that for every phone made. I started out with analog phones who's batteries were the size of today's smartphones. I would be fine with them being twice the thickness, as it would allow for twice the battery capacity, and probably allow for better mechanical zoom in the camera section. It would probably also allow for better heat dissipation. But it seems for some, that the battery life isn't any worse than what we've seen on the Pixel 3 series. It's the same price and has a lot of added hardware that wasn't in the 3, so that's good if true. I don't own a Pixel 4, I'm still on the fence as I have the 3. Which is why I'm researching this.

 

[wyelkins]

How big do you think these batteries should be?

How much SOT do you need?

The 4XL is fine and nobody is trying to ",justify" their purchase to anybody on this forum.

Yeah it could have been cheaper and I could have waited untill Black Friday, etc., etc.

If it's such a big deal to you, don't buy it.

May I suggest an iPhone?

 

[J Dubbs]

Those Cat S41 phones are supposed to have huge batteries in them and last forever...... plus you could beat somebody unconscious with one without hurting it if you needed a good self-defense weapon :O ;-)

 

[kolyan2k]

I still wonder what was going on through Google's head....let's use smaller batteries, reduce max screen brightness, and cap 90hz functionality only to certain times. Didn't they pay billions for HTC team to design phones for them? Or was it some sort of money laundering scheme lol