How do you read the battery results page?

[kirksucks]

This may seem like a lame question but what is all this stuff and what does it all mean?

 

[SpookDroid]

Hi there,

The graph is your battery life progression, and the bars below are just what they say and show that particular state of your phone with time.

For instance, from your graph, you know your phone has gone from 100 to around 45 percent in 13 hours and almost 6 minutes. From that, you can see that most of the time your mobile signal was crappy (browns and grays), with only a few times during that period with the signal being strong (green). Furthermore, the blue spots show that in that period, you used apps that polled for your location about 7 times. Also, you kept WiFi on for a few hours at first, then turned it off, then turned it back on at the end. Awake is the time your phone spent actually doing stuff, and the screen on is the times you actually turned your screen on. Usually, if the awake portion doesn't mostly match the Screen On portion, that means an app might be doing too much in the background. In your case, it doesn't seem out of the ordinary.

Additionally, if you tap on the graph, you'll get a list of apps and the battery percentage they've consumed. There you can see if an app is 'eating' through your battery more than it should. For instance, if you've streamed Netflix for two hours and check your battery status, the screen on and Netflix should be the top two 'consumers'. But if suddenly you see that, say, Facebook is above Netflix and you didn't even open Facebook, then that particular app is misbehaving and doing something that it shouldn't be doing (and I picked Facebook for the example because it's been very buggy lately and a lot of users, myself included, have reported sudden battery drains from it).

 

[kirksucks]

Thank you that cleared up a lot.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[SpookDroid]

No problem If you need anything else, just let us know We're here to help (or at least try to).

 

[lapk78]

Here's another lame question: How do I actually get to this screen? I can't seem to find the "battery" tab under my "settings" menu. Neither swiping down in the navigation bar and clicking on the little gear, nor entering the app drawer > settings can I find the "battery" tab. Why can't I find it? Sorry for such a noob question.

 

[kirksucks]

Are you talking about this? This is how I get there

 

[gpo1956]

Hi there,

The graph is your battery life progression, and the bars below are just what they say and show that particular state of your phone with time.

For instance, from your graph, you know your phone has gone from 100 to around 45 percent in 13 hours and almost 6 minutes. From that, you can see that most of the time your mobile signal was crappy (browns and grays), with only a few times during that period with the signal being strong (green). Furthermore, the blue spots show that in that period, you used apps that polled for your location about 7 times. Also, you kept WiFi on for a few hours at first, then turned it off, then turned it back on at the end. Awake is the time your phone spent actually doing stuff, and the screen on is the times you actually turned your screen on. Usually, if the awake portion doesn't mostly match the Screen On portion, that means an app might be doing too much in the background. In your case, it doesn't seem out of the ordinary.

Additionally, if you tap on the graph, you'll get a list of apps and the battery percentage they've consumed. There you can see if an app is 'eating' through your battery more than it should. For instance, if you've streamed Netflix for two hours and check your battery status, the screen on and Netflix should be the top two 'consumers'. But if suddenly you see that, say, Facebook is above Netflix and you didn't even open Facebook, then that particular app is misbehaving and doing something that it shouldn't be doing (and I picked Facebook for the example because it's been very buggy lately and a lot of users, myself included, have reported sudden battery drains from it).

Wow!! Thank you very much! I've searched and tried for a long time to find a way to decipher all this. Now it is crystal clear. Terrific job, and thanks again.

 

[SpookDroid]

Glad I could help If you have any more questions, you know where to find us!

 

[kirksucks]

Glad I could help If you have any more questions, you know where to find us!

So now that I'm on lollipop this screen has changed slightly. How do I figure out how long my battery has gone? Is there a way to switch from estimated time left and percent back to a straightforward number?

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[SpookDroid]

Yeah, my phone hasn't updated but I noticed that change on my tablet (which got the update a couple weeks ago). Unfortunately now there's no 'exact' way of knowing how long your device has been off the charger, just how much is left in your battery
You can make an educated guess, of course, but it's not as 'precise' as it was before. For instance, from your graph, I'd say you unplugged your device around 8AM on 4/6 and had 14% battery left by 10 or 11PM.

 

[kirksucks]

This screen is kinda useless now

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[SpookDroid]

You can still see the general information on when your device was awake VS what it was doing, and the process list is still there, but yeah... I liked it better before. Not sure if this is a Lollipop thing or a Samsung one, but still don't like it.