Question Battery life not as expected

[VoidedKN0X]

So i got my S21 Ultra a couple of weeks ago and the battery life isn't as good as people tell it to be... I wonder if this is normal or i have a faulty unit
Important: i am running the latest update on my exynos device (february security patch as of the making of this thread)

 

[iamnotkurtcobain]

What do you expect? You have used the phone almost 12 hours, used Samsung Music for nearly 8 hours and still have 78% battery left lol. This is great.

 

[VoidedKN0X]

What do you expect? You have used the phone almost 12 hours, used Samsung Music for nearly 8 hours and still have 78% battery left lol. This is great.

The SoT is pretty crap i can only get 5 to 6 hours if i'm lucky, all i do is watch youtube and netflix and nothing else pretty much, and since SoT is pretty important to me idk if i should wait for an update or get another unit

 

[Teezj]

If you are comparing to a Chinese phone, I would agree that the battery life is not great. Before buying S21 Ultra(exynos), I was using Mi 10T pro. It has better battery performance than S21 Ultra. The other thing that I dislike about would be the heat issue on S21 Ultra. Its horrible.

 

[mtm1401]

SOT is only one measure of battery life, the battery still depletes when the screen is off, especially if you're doing something like listening to music for 7 hours......

If you saw the YouTube 'battery drain' tests, the majority are in a room, mobile turned off and on WIFI. They are in constant use with minimal ramping/up down of the processor as they only switch apps every hour. These guys achieve up to 9 hours with constant use in optimal conditions.

If you extrapolate out your current usage you're on for 7 hours with 51 hours total, which is very very strong. People would kill for that endurance

At best you can expect 0.5% an hour drain if you aren't using the phone, but that's if you literally leave it overnight and don't touch it. More likely it'll be between 1-2% depending on usage, so if you calculate you've had roughly 10 hours of screen off, that's about 10% battery that isn't being used on screen on time, which equates to roughly an hour of SOT 'missed out on' if you were just to run the device with the screen on for the sake of it.

If you're truly only concerned about SOT, run a day without music in the background and see the improvement. It's a nonsensical thing to do as that's not how you use your phone, but will get you the numbers you want...

You're also using a high end processor and a large screen with a high refresh rate, it's going to use more juice than a mid range or low end phone. If you send that phone back, someone else is going to be very happy when they get it as their replacement

 

[Goku1992]

SOT is only one measure of battery life, the battery still depletes when the screen is off, especially if you're doing something like listening to music for 7 hours......

If you saw the YouTube 'battery drain' tests, the majority are in a room, mobile turned off and on WIFI. They are in constant use with minimal ramping/up down of the processor as they only switch apps every hour. These guys achieve up to 9 hours with constant use in optimal conditions.

If you extrapolate out your current usage you're on for 7 hours with 51 hours total, which is very very strong. People would kill for that endurance

At best you can expect 0.5% an hour drain if you aren't using the phone, but that's if you literally leave it overnight and don't touch it. More likely it'll be between 1-2% depending on usage, so if you calculate you've had roughly 10 hours of screen off, that's about 10% battery that isn't being used on screen on time, which equates to roughly an hour of SOT 'missed out on' if you were just to run the device with the screen on for the sake of it.

If you're truly only concerned about SOT, run a day without music in the background and see the improvement. It's a nonsensical thing to do as that's not how you use your phone, but will get you the numbers you want...

You're also using a high end processor and a large screen with a high refresh rate, it's going to use more juice than a mid range or low end phone. If you send that phone back, someone else is going to be very happy when they get it as their replacement

With my s21 ultta i can easily achieve 10-12hours of sot with browsjng and youtube on wlan with total runtime of 48hours.on mobile data its a good 35% less (also cause of brighter screen outdoors) but Overall its good battery life for me (note im debloated and using Samsung browser with darkmode!!)

 

[mattlcfc]

I'm doing OK on the battery. Turned off goggle discover on side screen has helped aswell as 5g disabled as I don't have it where I live atm

 

[Goku1992]

With my s21 ultta i can easily achieve 10-12hours of sot with browsjng and youtube on wlan with total runtime of 48hours.on mobile data its a good 35% less (also cause of brighter screen outdoors) but Overall its good battery life for me (note im debloated and using Samsung browser with darkmode!!)

Ive attached a screenshot. Note this was 90% with wlan

 

[mtm1401]

Ive attached a screenshot. Note this was 90% with wlan

What have you done other than debloat and Samsung browser?

 

[Goku1992]

What have you done other than debloat and Samsung browser?

Nothing running 60hz and wqhd (on my phone fhd and wqhd doesnt made a different more that 2-4% so....)

 

[mtm1401]

Nothing running 60hz and wqhd (on my phone fhd and wqhd doesnt made a different more that 2-4% so....)

Yea it'll be the 60hz getting you through then, makes sense

 

[Goku1992]

Yea it'll be the 60hz getting you through then, makes sense

Yes if you want the same smoothness and a good 10% better battery you can use the 96hz mod

 

[blackhawk]

Put brightness on manual. The display eats a lot of the battery. Try to keep it at 50% or less.
Turn off all animations and use dark mode/dark wallpapers. Junk like tic-tok, fb don't help.

 

[Goku1992]

Put brightness on manual. The display eats a lot of the battery. Try to keep it at 50% or less.
Turn off all animations and use dark mode/dark wallpapers. Junk like tic-tok, fb don't help.

Im using automatic brightness. Yes only using instagram, fb in the browser cause zhose notifications are annoing...

 

[blackhawk]

Im using automatic brightness. Yes only using instagram, fb in the browser cause zhose notifications are annoing...

Fb is malware, I don't care who or what's on it, it's off limits. Instagram... no way.
Tweeter just as bad as fb. Full boycott on all that junk until they f-f-fade away

Been using manual brightness control for over a year on my 10+. Occasionally I toggle it on but rarely. Going full brightness will greatly reduce OLEDs finite lifespan. Blue goes first... and the burnout isn't even. If I can get 5 years with just a battery change or two, I want it.
So far between Samsung's and Android's weak offerings I have zero incentive to upgrade hardware or firmware

 

[Goku1992]

Fb is malware, I don't care who or what's on it, it's off limits. Instagram... no way.
Tweeter just as bad as fb. Full boycott on all that junk until they f-f-fade away

Been using manual brightness control for over a year on my 10+. Occasionally I toggle it on but rarely. Going full brightness will greatly reduce OLEDs finite lifespan. Blue goes first... and the burnout isn't even. If I can get 5 years with just a battery change or two, I want it.
So far between Samsung's and Android's weak offerings I have zero incentive to upgrade hardware or firmware

Yes but if you are using them in tge browser they cant suck your battery up and im only using them for roughly 10minutes a day so no problem. But youre right they are like malware... Traking your location every few minutes and that ****

 

[blackhawk]

Yes but if you are using them in tge browser they cant suck your battery up and im only using them for roughly 10minutes a day so no problem. But youre right they are like malware... Traking your location every few minutes and that ****

I do 20-30% charges throughout the day.
Crap like Twitter and fb can cost you your job as well as privacy leading you open to attacks of all kinds. Zero rewards and lots of risk. No.
Remember the night of the long knives?
Think how much easier it be to do now...

 

[KingFatty]

Has there been testing on the battery effect of different wireless network modes, including while being connected to Wi-Fi?

I understand that 5G uses more battery, but I'm curious how that is affected when you remain connected to Wi-Fi for all data transfers (using 5G just for calls and texts).

Same question for the other network modes, like LTE/3G/2G vs LTE/2G etc. Or also when you are not connected to Wi-Fi.

I can't help worry that some people are getting bad battery life because they have a poor network signal?

 

[mtm1401]

Only rough but very little difference between 4g and WiFi when still, and that's in a location with 2 bars signal. Seems like the phone sleeps better with mobile data on.

It's hard to make a direct comparison with WiFi Vs network, as a lot of the network drain is when moving and polling for new antenna. When looking at signal strength, 4g/5g have the same dBm and 3g/2g have the same dBm, but 4g needs less dBm for a higher transfer rate than 3g, so may use less power over time.

Also I don't think 5g is inherently more power hungry than 4g (I may be wrong), again it's just less available and shorter radio waves, and until now 5g has relied on external modems.

 

[KingFatty]

Exactly, I wonder if our S21 Ultra is much better with battery life on 5G, because our SoC includes the 5G modem and it's not external?

My desire is to just keep my phone on 5G while I'm at home idle and the phone is connected to home Wi-Fi. I wonder if there is a battery savings to be had if I switch to LTE while I'm at home on Wi-Fi and the phone is just idle.