Location on or off makes much difference?

[Keith Molloy]

Hey guys! How much difference does location being on or off make to battery life? Mine was on by default but decided today that i would turn it off! The only apps i thought that needed it were dating apps like Tinder, Pof etc because when it was off they wouldn't show any search results but i don't use them much so figured i could just enable it when using them.

Since turning it off however, it seems EVERYTHING requires location to be turned on! Iam now plagued by pop ups anytime i do anything that "location needs to be enabled in settings"

I also had mine on gps only but noticed that when its toggled off and back on again it automatically goes back to 'gps, wifi and mobile network'

Do you guys leave location on? If i thought it would make a significant improvement to battery life then i would happily turn it off although it seems i NEED to have it on for most apps to function properly???

 

[Rukbat]

The GPS receiver itself uses very little power - until some app asks it for the current location. About th only time it will drw a significant amont of power is when you're using an app like Maps, which is constantly calling it - but if it's in the car nd plugged in, that doesn't matter.

As for GPS, wifi and mobile network, unless you're in Airplane mode, you're already connected to the mobile network (it's using the known tower location), so that doesn't cost much, and wifi comes on long enough to search for known wifi locations, so it's not much power usage. If you use the phone the same way every day, you might notice a few minutes less charge to charge time using location services, unless you're using them all the time, but just having Location enabled doesn't take much power.

 

[erasat]

Hey guys! How much difference does location being on or off make to battery life? Mine was on by default but decided today that i would turn it off! The only apps i thought that needed it were dating apps like Tinder, Pof etc because when it was off they wouldn't show any search results but i don't use them much so figured i could just enable it when using them.

Since turning it off however, it seems EVERYTHING requires location to be turned on! Iam now plagued by pop ups anytime i do anything that "location needs to be enabled in settings"

I also had mine on gps only but noticed that when its toggled off and back on again it automatically goes back to 'gps, wifi and mobile network'

Do you guys leave location on? If i thought it would make a significant improvement to battery life then i would happily turn it off although it seems i NEED to have it on for most apps to function properly???

If you were using Location via GPS only, then you were using some battery obviously but everything in our phones uses battery so there's not an issue, if you use it and need it, then you turn it on.

The issue is the way Google has incorporated their Location Reporting into the Location History the service used by Google now cards and some other services, you can see this settings on Location Services under Location.

If you were using Location just with GPS then add I've read that disable Location History and Reporting, so that's the reason that I say that in your case the battery usage was just limited to whatever the apps you use are requesting, some of them use very minimal location information and battery.

The other scenario is to use Location with any of the other 2 options, WiFi and cell or GPS, wifi and cell, but both of these activate the Location History settings and you will notice immediately the high battery usage as it will be using the Location Reporting also, why did Google remove the option to turn Reporting off? It seems too many people were turning that off and that is what they use to earn their revenues.

Try it and you'll see what I'm saying, but I think the way you have it is the best way for you and the way you should have it so you can keep using your apps as you need them.

 

[Keith Molloy]

So its best to have it on using gps only and have google location history off?? Thats how i had it set up along but iam constantly seeing the little gps icon flashing in the notification bar and just thought it might be using alot of battery.

 

[erasat]

So its best to have it on using gps only and have google location history off?? Thats how i had it set up along but iam constantly seeing the little gps icon flashing in the notification bar and just thought it might be using alot of battery.

Yes, in your case, that's your best bet, but yes, if the app is requesting location constantly then it will use battery accordingly.

 

[Keith Molloy]

Yes, in your case, that's your best bet, but yes, if the app is requesting location constantly then it will use battery accordingly.

Thanks pal. Yeah it seems handier just to keep it like that i suppose! I just didnt realize that other apps etc were using gps! I thought only pof and tinder needed it on, thats why i was gonna turn it off because i dont use them much but it seems i was wrong and its used alot more then i thought! Just hope its not using a significant amount of battery is all! Usually i used to have this off on other phones but from what i remember, previous phones performed fine without it and i only ever needed it on if i wanted to check the weather.

 

[Keith Molloy]

Slightly off topic but on the subject of battery life! Is it through that using wifi 2.4ghz uses less battery then 5ghz ? I read this somewhere recently but dont know if its true! I often use 5ghz because its supposedly faster although the range is not as great.

 

[erasat]

Slightly off topic but on the subject of battery life! Is it through that using wifi 2.4ghz uses less battery then 5ghz ? I read this somewhere recently but dont know if its true! I often use 5ghz because its supposedly faster although the range is not as great.

It was me who began a thread about that last month and in my case it was true, when I posted that, one of this forum Ambassador, Almeuit, found the same results on his phone, that thread has disappeared from the huge list of threads because it seems that just a few paid attention to it, it's a shame that maybe newcomers and a lot of regular users never saw it or if they did, they never tried it.

 

[konvajw]

My experience seems strange and non-explainable, but my battery life seems more than a bit better when I actually have location turned on in power saving mode (vs. when location is turned off completely) Makes no sense to me. Could some app(s) looking for location information be polling for a location too often when it is turned off since it can't get the location? That's the only possible thing I can think of, but don't know if that's likely or not. Strange in my opinion that my phone behaves this way. Thoughts?

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