is the battery life really that bad?

[anon(661246)]

What device are you using now?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

htc m8 gpe

 

[Aquila]

From what I can tell, every flagship since the Nexus 5 has been able to blow through a normal day for most users without issues. The Nexus 6 hasn't made it through 2 full days for me yet, but hasn't been under a day yet either. I charged up from 30% to about 95% yesterday at 3PM and it is currently at 72%. The trend thing on Battery Widget Reborn says that it'll last another 44 hours, but it is wrong - about 7 of the last 15 hours was sleeping. I'll probably have to put it on the charger tonight when I go to bed, so that'd be after 30-33 hours.

Realistically, every device that can blow through more than 16 hours of whatever usage you can throw at it has either "good, very solid" or "great" battery life. These recent devices that easily make it through 24+ just take any of the question out of it.

 

[raqball]

Which Android phone has a better battery life?

Note 4, Xperia Z3, Xperia Z3 Compact just to name a few..

 

[UJ95x]

From what I can tell, every flagship since the Nexus 5 has been able to blow through a normal day for most users without issues. The Nexus 6 hasn't made it through 2 full days for me yet, but hasn't been under a day yet either. I charged up from 30% to about 95% yesterday at 3PM and it is currently at 72%. The trend thing on Battery Widget Reborn says that it'll last another 44 hours, but it is wrong - about 7 of the last 15 hours was sleeping. I'll probably have to put it on the charger tonight when I go to bed, so that'd be after 30-33 hours.

Realistically, every device that can blow through more than 16 hours of whatever usage you can throw at it has either "good, very solid" or "great" battery life. These recent devices that easily make it through 24+ just take any of the question out of it.

That's the thing...it can't get through 16 hours of "whatever usage." I know it wouldn't last me a full day, and for a lot of power users it wouldn't either

Sent from my Galaxy S4 running Lollipop 5.0.2

 

[Jeremy8000]

That's the thing...it can't get through 16 hours of "whatever usage." I know it wouldn't last me a full day, and for a lot of power users it wouldn't either

Sent from my Galaxy S4 running Lollipop 5.0.2

There's no phone out yet that can manage 16 hours under the greatest duress a user could ask of its battery, but there are a large number that can manage the needs of most power users. Fortunately there's no law against using car chargers, chargers at work, or battery packs should we anticipate needing to refuel.

I'm really looking forward to the time that may be in the not-too-distant future where battery technology makes that next leap to where measure screen time in days, not hours, or refuel time in seconds (both of which are quite possible).

 

[milehigherik]

I can go 14 hours average before I reach 15% battery left. Averaging 4.5-5 hours screen on time. Again, depends on what you're doing during the screen on time. If you're concerned about the battery life then get the droid turbo. I only ditched that phone and Verizon because I use a lot of data. Now I have t-mobile unlimited data and am just fine with the nexus 6 battery.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[UJ95x]

Note 4, Xperia Z3, Xperia Z3 Compact just to name a few..

Or every 2014 flagship that isn't the Moto X

Sent from my Galaxy S4 running Lollipop 5.0.2

 

[milehigherik]

There's no phone out yet that can manage 16 hours under the greatest duress a user could ask of its battery, but there are a large number that can manage the needs of most power users. Fortunately there's no law against using car chargers, chargers at work, or battery packs should we anticipate needing to refuel.

I'm really looking forward to the time that may be in the not-too-distant future where battery technology makes that next leap to where measure screen time in days, not hours, or refuel time in seconds (both of which are quite possible).

Then the complaint will be price. Not by me, but people will NEVER be completely satisfied period. Either it will do this but not that, or they left this out from the previous model etc. Then there are those with their eyes always on the horizon waiting eternally for the next device complaining about the present model and still buy something totally different because they take the "free with two year contract" phone because they didn't ever have the money to begin with. They're called trolls.

Then there's me. I know it's not an investment and I lose money on every phone I buy. I always want the latest phone. I average about 3 phones a year, I've had almost every flagship phone except the iPhone.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[Aquila]

That's the thing...it can't get through 16 hours of "whatever usage." I know it wouldn't last me a full day, and for a lot of power users it wouldn't either

Sent from my Galaxy S4 running Lollipop 5.0.2

Do you mean 24+ or 16? It probably will never do 16 hours of SOT, but it should easily knock out 16-24 with 4-6 hours SOT for just about anyone. Obviously heavy gaming or FHD movies non-stop and/or poor signal will degrade battery life, but I'd have a hard time believing that someone is running for a charger midway through the day with this (or really any recent) device unless they're doing something pretty abnormal. What are "power users" doing that I'm not?

 

[Aquila]

Or every 2014 flagship that isn't the Moto X

Sent from my Galaxy S4 running Lollipop 5.0.2

Per Battery Widget Reborn:

Average battery on Moto X lasts 22 hours 13 minutes and takes 2 hours 38 minutes to charge. The 22 is because I charge it for about 2 hours every night before I go to sleep.
Average battery on Nexus lasts 37 hours 60 minutes and takes 3 hours 26 minutes to charge. I usually put this one on the charger either at night or at work, usually when it gets to about 25-30% and leave it there until at least 85-90% but sometimes full.

 

[NickA]

Do you mean 24+ or 16? It probably will never do 16 hours of SOT, but it should easily knock out 16-24 with 4-6 hours SOT for just about anyone. Obviously heavy gaming or FHD movies non-stop and/or poor signal will degrade battery life, but I'd have a hard time believing that someone is running for a charger midway through the day with this (or really any recent) device unless they're doing something pretty abnormal. What are "power users" doing that I'm not?

I have to agree. I always wonder if I'm not using my phone enough! When I hear users says they are looking for a charger at 3:00 PM it makes me wonder what they are doing. I do know that a poor signal will drain a phone like nobody's business.

 

[UJ95x]

Do you mean 24+ or 16? It probably will never do 16 hours of SOT, but it should easily knock out 16-24 with 4-6 hours SOT for just about anyone. Obviously heavy gaming or FHD movies non-stop and/or poor signal will degrade battery life, but I'd have a hard time believing that someone is running for a charger midway through the day with this (or really any recent) device unless they're doing something pretty abnormal. What are "power users" doing that I'm not?

You said: "every device that can blow through more than 16 hours of whatever usage you can throw at it has either 'good, very solid' or 'great' battery life."

Which the Nexus 6 can't do. Obviously I don't expect it to last 16 hours with the screen on, but there are lots of users who do heavy gaming or streaming (I'm the latter) for whom it would not last 16 hours with our usage pattern, while there are other devices that will (Note 4, iPhone 6 Plus, One Plus One all have outstanding battery even by my standards)

 

[UJ95x]

Per Battery Widget Reborn:

Average battery on Moto X lasts 22 hours 13 minutes and takes 2 hours 38 minutes to charge. The 22 is because I charge it for about 2 hours every night before I go to sleep.
Average battery on Nexus lasts 37 hours 60 minutes and takes 3 hours 26 minutes to charge. I usually put this one on the charger either at night or at work, usually when it gets to about 25-30% and leave it there until at least 85-90% but sometimes full.

That was in reply to which devices had better battery than the Nexus 6. Which is every major flagship from 2014 that wasn't the Moto X. The Moto X has worse battery than the Nexus 6.

 

[Aquila]

That was in reply to which devices had better battery than the Nexus 6. Which is every major flagship from 2014 that wasn't the Moto X. The Moto X has worse battery than the Nexus 6.

So the X is my work device, which means it's being used for phone calls, texts, hangouts and email most of the day and that's about it - it's on and off constantly, usually in a poor signal area unless I'm mobile (my office has 1x signal most of the day) but it does 0 games, etc. It's easily outlasting every day being used as a very frequently used device but nothing absurdly heavy. Average of 22 hours on that, without changing any settings, etc - I don't micromanage radios or anything like that.

The Nexus is my personal and school device, which is mostly hangouts with a bunch of Android nerds and #FearTheV, some games, a lot of videos and a few hours of streaming Google Play Music each day.

I'm not claiming that it'll last through a full day for everyone, obviously I can't speak for how others use their devices. I'm saying 16 hours into this charge (starting at 95%) I was still at 72% and now I'm 22.5 hours into the same charge and sitting at 45%. Obviously I used more in the last 6 hours (27% over 6 hours=4.5%/hr average) than I did in the first 16 (23% over 16 hours=1.4%/hr average) for a total weighted average of 50% used in 22.5 hours = 2 2/9%/hr average drain. That puts it on track if I continued on the same usage to be good for approximately 45 hours (I know it probably won't beat 40 hours, but doesn't matter because I typically charge after 30 to 36 anyways). To have it last less than 16 hours we'd have to go through 6.25%/hr, which is obviously possible but I would venture my assumption that most users are using their device less than me, not more than me - and certainly not 50-300% more than I am.

16 hours is just the number I chose because I think that people average 8 hours of down time per day (sleeping, not on their phone, etc) - since that 8 hours is more than sufficient time to charge every device, the need to consistently trounce 16 hours is important - but if users are having a hard time getting to 16, then I would suggest that the choice in device may be incorrect and the tasks they're trying to accomplish may be better suited to a larger device with a larger battery and better heat disbursement. But that's just me being judgmental.

 

[Gary_Berg]

I am puzzled over the behavior of my Nexus 5. I upgraded to Lollipop yesterday via OTA. Under KitKat my battery life was good enough that I would worry if the battery dropped below 50% because that was very unusual (I have a tablet that I use for most things).

I took the phone off the charger this morning at 6AM. By 12:00 it was down to 58%. I only used it for a few minutes and made no phone calls. I charged it back up to 88% by 12:30 and by 2PM it had dropped to 70% of charge with the only usage to listen to Doggcatcher for 10 minutes. Screen brightness is set low, maybe 20%.

Using GSAM, top user is Android System with 25% of power used which corresponds to 6:54 CPU minutes used. WiFI corresponds to 10%, screen to 23% (11m 56s). Underneath the Settings, Battery section, however, Android System is said to take 28:19m CPU, keep awake 33:51. Screen is 4%, SOT 22m. I'm confused at the differences between the two sets of stats.

I have a good WiFi connection, cellular is 3-4 bars.

Phone normally rides in my front shirt pocket, right now after sitting out for several minutes it is still running 95F, 400mA, 3.96V. Phone is not rooted.

I've got the feeling that either there is something cranking the CPU in the background and not being noticed by GSAM or the charging circuitry/reporting is confused. This phone has not yet been factory reset; I'd rather avoid doing that.

The phone did well on battery running Kitkat, why is it so much worse under Lollipop?

 

[UJ95x]

So the X is my work device, which means it's being used for phone calls, texts, hangouts and email most of the day and that's about it - it's on and off constantly, usually in a poor signal area unless I'm mobile (my office has 1x signal most of the day) but it does 0 games, etc. It's easily outlasting every day being used as a very frequently used device but nothing absurdly heavy. Average of 22 hours on that, without changing any settings, etc - I don't micromanage radios or anything like that.

The Nexus is my personal and school device, which is mostly hangouts with a bunch of Android nerds and #FearTheV, some games, a lot of videos and a few hours of streaming Google Play Music each day.

I'm not claiming that it'll last through a full day for everyone, obviously I can't speak for how others use their devices. I'm saying 16 hours into this charge (starting at 95%) I was still at 72% and now I'm 22.5 hours into the same charge and sitting at 45%. Obviously I used more in the last 6 hours (27% over 6 hours=4.5%/hr average) than I did in the first 16 (23% over 16 hours=1.4%/hr average) for a total weighted average of 50% used in 22.5 hours = 2 2/9%/hr average drain. That puts it on track if I continued on the same usage to be good for approximately 45 hours (I know it probably won't beat 40 hours, but doesn't matter because I typically charge after 30 to 36 anyways). To have it last less than 16 hours we'd have to go through 6.25%/hr, which is obviously possible but I would venture my assumption that most users are using their device less than me, not more than me - and certainly not 50-300% more than I am.

16 hours is just the number I chose because I think that people average 8 hours of down time per day (sleeping, not on their phone, etc) - since that 8 hours is more than sufficient time to charge every device, the need to consistently trounce 16 hours is important - but if users are having a hard time getting to 16, then I would suggest that the choice in device may be incorrect and the tasks they're trying to accomplish may be better suited to a larger device with a larger battery and better heat disbursement. But that's just me being judgmental.

How much screen on time for the Moto X though? I'd wager 3 hours tops, which at least for the people on this site, is pretty light usage for 2 days.

My point was that of all of the 2014 devices, the Nexus 6 isn't AS good as the others. Doesn't mean that for some it won't be enough. But again, the people on this site most likely use their phone a lot more than the average user. I would consider myself a pretty heavy user, and it definitely wouldn't last me a full day. Especially if I want to keep my battery above 30% before charging. The two main competitors for the Nexus 6, are a lot better in that regard (and the rest of the hardware in general)

Sent from my Galaxy S4 running Lollipop 5.0.2

 

[Robbie317]

I can go 17 - 18 hours with about 3 hours of SOT with my Nexus 6 (Which for me is regular usage during the work week) on the weekends I am usually in the 12 - 14 hours range with 5 - 6 SOT...... It's not OUTSTANDING but compared to my Nexus 5 it blows it out of the water..... Even using just wireless charging if I am out and about all day and throw it down for about an hour on the TYLT Vu charger I can now go all night with ease....

Now I don't play any games or really watch much video outside of you tube clips.. My primary usage is internet, twitter, facebook, google+, texting, email and a few phone calls.... if I sit and watch a 2 hour long movie it will crush the battery.. or put a big DENT in it... But I mostly cast to my TV vs watching on the device (Which frees the device up to surf the web)

but for me 12 hours with 5 or 6 SOT is plenty good enough.... I have not even really used the turbo charger... but when the time arises that will be a good little thing to pop some extra juice in a pinch....

 

[coryh131]

I've only had mine one week but my Nexus 6 lasts longer than my Galaxy S4 lasted with two full batteries (and I'm not kidding).

 

[sdc1]

I'm on day 3 with my Nexus 6. Ambient display is on, location services on. I took it off charge at 8:30, it's now 14:30 and I'm at 39%. My use had been moderate today, some browsing the net, half an hour of music and a 20 minute call. That's just not good enough. If it doesn't level out I'm returning it.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[cozzy123]

Takes a week or two for the battery to come into its own. For your phone have the 5.0.1 update? That made a difference for many people with the battery.

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