Samsung S4 Battery Drain

[Ace_22]

Hi, I have just crossed over from having an iPhone for several years to now using a Samsung Galaxy S4.

Phone looks great although after setting it up and putting widgets in place such as the local news, sports, tech news and also google+ go etc on my various screens, I notice that the battery drains at a rate I have not seen before.

I have had to disable all the extra features such as air gesture, eye movement etc and also taken away some background items such as the Samsung Video and other bloated apps.

After doing that, I notice that it ran down to 1% from around 15% during the night.

Thinking about switching back over to iPhone where I the battery was quite decent!

Any thoughts or ideas on what is causing my S4 to haemorrhage battery life so much?

Any particular services I should be disabling?

[drey_p]

Hi there

The first thing to realise is that the battery is new and with any new battery it takes several charge and discharge cycles to get the best life out of it. 

Another thing I would not recommend is letting the battery run down so low as it can cause irreparable damage to the battery itself. It's actually better to charge it more regularly. 

[Ace_22]

Ok,

Are there any apps or anything I can disable that are known to decrease battery life?

Also, I can see on the notifications that apps and items are updating, is there an option to stop all this until I want to perform any updates?

[jeffkinn]

With Android you can either turn off syncing entirely or manage it on an app by app basis. Unlike iOS where all the settings are in one place each app has it's own settings menu. This will be accessed either by pressing the settings button (the one to the right of the home button) or by pressing on the 3 horizontal lines on the left hand edge of the screen on the app window.

You can also download an app called GSam Battey Monitor and that will tell you which apps are using the battery.

For general comments I'd say turn down the brightness and turn off WiFi, GPS and Bluetooth until you need them.

[hrym]

Personally, I'd turn off automatic updating of apps - is that in Settings|Applications or within Google Play?  It can cause problems if apps update when you're doing something else as the two process can slow each other down, and you also probably only want to do it over wifi to cut down mobile data use.

You'll get a notification when there are app updates and you can than do them when it's convenient.  I would allow your Google account to sync automatically, though, as that'll keep your contacts, calendar and emails up to date (depending on which of those you use - though syncing contacts is pretty much an essential as it's a backup).

[thesoupdragon]

Just to add to the already great advice from the Guys...

Most apps that feed you notifications such as Facebook, email, weather etc... will have their own sync frequency setting.

Moving from syncing Facebook every 5mins to every hour can have a huge increase in battery performance.

(only using facebook as an example)

Obviously how you choose to set the frequency is personal to you and your life style...

[Ace_22]

Thanks for the tips all.

I have come across those extended batteries from Anker and Zero Lemon or whatever they are called and the Anker ones are especially getting good reviews on Amazon; anyone thought about getting one of these or has one already? I want to use the S4 to its full capability and seemed to have locked down alot of the gadgets on it so far to compensate for battery life.

[thesoupdragon]

I don't use one myself but a friend used one for his Galaxy S1. It was the thick battery type where you get a special shaped rear cover for the Phone.

He thought it was excellent, in fact he is still using his S1 with that battery now!

[hrym]

You ought to be able to get a day's life out of the standard battery, though updating widgets and apps as well as things like wifi and Bluetooth are all power-sapping.  Actually, one of the biggest consumers of power that I've found is a weak network signal - the phone boosts the radio to compensate and this gets though the battery like almost nothing else.

If any of that's the case here, then an extended battery has to be worth a try.

[chunk166]

 A weak signal is the main cause I'm having that is "killing" my battery, the postcode area has been subject to a lot problems over the last 2 - 2 1/2 years to which there is a temp antenna but its still not good!!!! But if your phones are still under warranty then you are entitiled to get a new battery "free of charge" which is what i am doing as i have only had my S4 just over 6 months?? It can be at 100% @ 10pm but the next day its about 15% @ 7pm which really is not good!!!!!!!