Really bad Nexus 4 battery life

[startup8100]

I just got a Nexus 4.

The battery life gave me less than 5 hours of talk time. I understand that it might not be exactly 15 hours but less than 5 is ridiculous.

I called Google and let them know this: 35% (talk time) of the 54% total used was due to talk time.

This come out to 19.6% of the battery was used by talking alone. 54 Minutes is what I used!!! Yeah, I didn't need a calculator to figure out this battery gives you less than 5 hours talk time. He even admitted they get returns ALL THE TIME for this EXACT PROBLEM.

Here is the hitch, if you return it they hit you for a 15% restocking fee!! He wanted to swap it and I asked if it restarted my 14 days. Answer is NO. The only way to not get stuck with a crappy phone is to return this, and get a full refund. Doing a swap out will put you well past the 14 days. Then you have a $390 dollar (w shipping handling/tax) paperweight.

The tech guy said it is luck of the draw and that a large percentage of these batteries are really bad......................I am sad, was looking forward to traveling in europe w an unlocked phone......now it seems I will have to drop 700 on the devilish iphone.......oh well.

I feel your pain

Sent from my iPhone

 

[Orr Hazout]

My nexus 4 battery is good when not in use. But when i turn the screen on it drains the battery.
I lose 1% per minute. Even if the apps are off and the screen is just the home screen.
Its not normal isnt it?

 

[startup8100]

My nexus 4 battery is good when not in use. But when i turn the screen on it drains the battery.
I lose 1% per minute. Even if the apps are off and the screen is just the home screen.
Its not normal isnt it?

I guess that's normal. Mine does the same. 1% in a minute or less when I am actively using it on screen

Sent from my iPhone

 

[Orr Hazout]

Thanks. Its on low brightness yours too?
Thats pretty poor isn't it?
Anyone else?

 

[startup8100]

Thanks. Its on low brightness yours too?
Thats pretty poor isn't it?
Anyone else?

Yeah... Very bad battery life compared to other phones. My brightness is at the minimum all the time except when I couldn't see what's on the screen when I go out...

Sent from my iPhone

 

[HawaiianLaker]

I just got a Nexus 4.

The battery life gave me less than 5 hours of talk time. I understand that it might not be exactly 15 hours but less than 5 is ridiculous.

I called Google and let them know this: 35% (talk time) of the 54% total used was due to talk time.

This come out to 19.6% of the battery was used by talking alone. 54 Minutes is what I used!!! Yeah, I didn't need a calculator to figure out this battery gives you less than 5 hours talk time. He even admitted they get returns ALL THE TIME for this EXACT PROBLEM.

Here is the hitch, if you return it they hit you for a 15% restocking fee!! He wanted to swap it and I asked if it restarted my 14 days. Answer is NO. The only way to not get stuck with a crappy phone is to return this, and get a full refund. Doing a swap out will put you well past the 14 days. Then you have a $390 dollar (w shipping handling/tax) paperweight.

The tech guy said it is luck of the draw and that a large percentage of these batteries are really bad......................I am sad, was looking forward to traveling in europe w an unlocked phone......now it seems I will have to drop 700 on the devilish iphone.......oh well.

"tech guy" is probably not his title, most likely its customer service rep. Working tech support for Verizon and now att, I cant tell you how many ppl come in thinking their phone is bad or the battery is bad because the battery life isn't as long as it should be. Its probably the number one complaint. The 2 things that will drian the battery the faster are the screen(big and high res) and data useage. I know everyone looks are battery usage but they should also be looking at data usage. the idea that a "Large percentage" is bad makes me doubt this. I would say wipe it and use it stock for a day, no downloaded apps and see what that is like. The best way to prove its a hardware problem is to make sure its not software.

 

[fernandezhjr]

My nexus 4 battery is good when not in use. But when i turn the screen on it drains the battery.
I lose 1% per minute. Even if the apps are off and the screen is just the home screen.
Its not normal isnt it?

That is not anywheres near normal. At that rate, you will drain battery in one hour and fourty minutes of screen time. I get over six hours of screen time if I use all my battery. I run my brightness at one third and nothing turned off. Background data, syncing, gps, wifi, all always turned on.

 

[haillyl]

I think 10% for 30mins is normal, im using optimus g which has almost the same hardware with nexus 4 can have around 6 hours+ browsing time with wifi and around 4hours with mobile network, note that mobile network drain more battery than wifi. Besides that lower brightness will save more juice for you. This duration is normal for a 2100 mAh battery.

 

[Lanhoj]

That's why I recently started using the battery of my Z10 as an external battery keeping it with me to charge my N4 (and a few other devices) as needed
View attachment 70167

 

[meekb2g]

I have been getting pretty bad battery life lately and had noticed my battery temp getting pretty high with very light usage.
Currently its at 116?F is that normal? Everything seems to be functioning OK. I'm thinking the high temperature is killing my battery.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

 

[avidberry]

I have around 12 hours of battery usage with 3.5 hours of screen on time with stock rom and franco kernel, without wifi at all (pure 3G). I have 3 gmail accounts synced and gps off. I'd say that's an improvement as compared to stock kernel.

The question is did you not doing some researches prior to your purchase? Nexus 4 poor battery life is quite a well known problem. Well, imo, it's still comparable to Samsung GS 3.


Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

 

[khooi8913]

well, with auto brightness and 3G on, i managed to get 2.5 hours of browsing only...
and 5minutes of talk time took me 3% of battery life.. i install less apps, light usage, lols, for my nexus 4

 

[newsman787]

I simply count on plugging in my Nexus 4 anytime I can. Battery is the only real weakness I've found.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

 

[badbrad17]

That's why I recently started using the battery of my Z10 as an external battery keeping it with me to charge my N4 (and a few other devices) as needed
View attachment 70167

LOL. I don't quite know what to say. Your poor Z10 has been relegated to be a backup battery. Poor BB.

 

[badbrad17]

All the phones in our house. iPhone 5, HTC One, Samsung Galaxy S2 and my Nexus 4 get similar battery life. The S2 is the worst overall, but my new HTC One, The Nexus 4 and iPhone are all very similar. You can conserve power if you want to by toggling things as needed. That is all you need to know. It;s not that hard. Just turn off data, GPS and wifi when not in use and the phone will last all day. The iPhone is much harder to toggle these things off so it usually is dead first.

 

[dkhmwilliams]

Today was my first full day at work using my Nexus 4. I was a little nervous because I didn't have a car charger and I didn't have means to plug it in during the day. On top if that, I ended up working a twelve hour day. I used the phone normally and it lasted the twelve hours. I got home and had 40 percent battery left. I would say that is pretty good.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Android Central Forums

 

[anon5664829]

I just got a Nexus 4.

The battery life gave me less than 5 hours of talk time. I understand that it might not be exactly 15 hours but less than 5 is ridiculous.

I called Google and let them know this: 35% (talk time) of the 54% total used was due to talk time.

This come out to 19.6% of the battery was used by talking alone. 54 Minutes is what I used!!! Yeah, I didn't need a calculator to figure out this battery gives you less than 5 hours talk time. He even admitted they get returns ALL THE TIME for this EXACT PROBLEM.

Here is the hitch, if you return it they hit you for a 15% restocking fee!! He wanted to swap it and I asked if it restarted my 14 days. Answer is NO. The only way to not get stuck with a crappy phone is to return this, and get a full refund. Doing a swap out will put you well past the 14 days. Then you have a $390 dollar (w shipping handling/tax) paperweight.

The tech guy said it is luck of the draw and that a large percentage of these batteries are really bad......................I am sad, was looking forward to traveling in europe w an unlocked phone......now it seems I will have to drop 700 on the devilish iphone.......oh well.

devilish? wow.

 

[Captainbob767]

I just got a Nexus 4.

The battery life gave me less than 5 hours of talk time. I understand that it might not be exactly 15 hours but less than 5 is ridiculous.

I called Google and let them know this: 35% (talk time) of the 54% total used was due to talk time.

This come out to 19.6% of the battery was used by talking alone. 54 Minutes is what I used!!! Yeah, I didn't need a calculator to figure out this battery gives you less than 5 hours talk time. He even admitted they get returns ALL THE TIME for this EXACT PROBLEM.

Here is the hitch, if you return it they hit you for a 15% restocking fee!! He wanted to swap it and I asked if it restarted my 14 days. Answer is NO. The only way to not get stuck with a crappy phone is to return this, and get a full refund. Doing a swap out will put you well past the 14 days. Then you have a $390 dollar (w shipping handling/tax) paperweight.

The tech guy said it is luck of the draw and that a large percentage of these batteries are really bad......................I am sad, was looking forward to traveling in europe w an unlocked phone......now it seems I will have to drop 700 on the devilish iphone.......oh well.

"A large percentage of the batteries are bad." Sounds like total BS to me.. If you are using the phone in an area with marginal cell coverage, a cellphone will go though a battery pretty quickly, no matter what brand of phone.

 

[joel betances]

It all depends on the settings
What I do is I disable all the widgets since they tend to drain a lot of battery

Also when I'm not using the Internet I disable my mobile data in settings

When I do this my battery last all day with a few hours of calling, text, and listening to music

 

[gusar2000]

I have been getting sub-par battery life since I got the phone. Last week I started using the charger my gf got with her MetroPCS phone, the LG Motion. My battery life is excellent now. Idk if the stock N4 charger has a defect or what, but it's night and day difference. I did notice, on my stock charger, that sometimes I would wake up in the morning, and as soon as I unplugged it from the charger, it would be at 96%

I'm new with N4, today morning noticed same thing - after unplugging N4 from charger, battery shown 97-96% after night charging. Not 100%.
It was actually the third time I charged it yet (just got new N4).
Previous time I charged it with the charger from N7 and believe battery was 100% (after about 3-4 Hrs). A little weird...
Regarding battery life - I'm not impressed, but probably it's what to be expected from a computer squeezed into a cell phone...
Working on improving stand buy time and it became better now (after disabling Google services, notifications, widgets, etc.)