I am one of the ones getting over 24 hours on the Nexus with the extended battery, and it is true I don't use it as much as some here do. However, I read a book for almost 4 hours with the screen at 25% and from the posts I have seen from the poorest performing Nexus they could not do that - let alone go another 12 plus hours after that with some light email, text and phone calls. I am not rooted, have the blue tooth off unless I am using it, WiFi on almost all the time, no special apps loaded for battery life and left all the Verizon apps enabled.
Other than the obvious factor - I don't use the phone quite as much as someone else might - it seems to me the critical factor is how strong my 4G signal is - the tower is right next to my house and another tower right next to my work, so that covers 95%+ of my days since I got the phone.
Other than the obvious factor - I don't use the phone quite as much as someone else might - it seems to me the critical factor is how strong my 4G signal is - the tower is right next to my house and another tower right next to my work, so that covers 95%+ of my days since I got the phone.