Nexus 5x Battery Life Thread

[Darkknight512]

Interesting test and results, thanks for sharing. Based on estimated power usage would I be correct in guessing somewhere around 25% brightness was used?

Whatever 1 step above minimum is. Probably 5-10%. So yes, nearly best case scenario.

 

[daver68]

I understand what you mean by that, good theory. Nothing like that in Audible. DC external player mode makes it want to launch another app to play the file, which of course doesn't keep track of listening progress. Wondering if the devs should be contacted for more info. Cheers.

I'm willing to bet that if you use Google Play Music to just play a couple of podcast files (probably stored in /Android/data/com.app.folder.name/*) for an hour or two, you'd see the same results as if you just listened to music for 2 hours.
At this point, I can only assume that there's some sort of tunneling happening with Play Music, but not the other apps. Maybe it's an EQ thing.

 

[renton82]

Today, frustrated for poor battery life of my Nexus 5X i've done a factory reset. Before factory reset, battery drain about 3-4% in one hour, now, here you are the result! Apart for first part of the graph, where had installing and upgrading apps, the second part is fantastic! The phone was not only layed on a desk, but i took with me as i walked.

I don't know why or wich app drained my battery before, but now i am heading for exclusion! When i taked these screenshot i have just installed whatsapp, telegram, amazon apps, now i installed Instagram and Play News... i thing i'll proceed so until i'll find a guilty app (if it will be...)

 

[bblzd]

Today, frustrated for poor battery life of my Nexus 5X i've done a factory reset. Before factory reset, battery drain about 3-4% in one hour, now, here you are the result! Apart for first part of the graph, where had installing and upgrading apps, the second part is fantastic! The phone was not only layed on a desk, but i took with me as i walked.

I don't know why or wich app drained my battery before, but now i am heading for exclusion! When i taked these screenshot i have just installed whatsapp, telegram, amazon apps, now i installed Instagram and Play News... i thing i'll proceed so until i'll find a guilty app (if it will be...)

Kudos to you for trying basic troubleshooting steps and resolving your issue. A couple people here are only willing to complain and not willing to do anything to help themselves so that is refreshing to see.

Process of elimination is a great way to find out which of those apps was causing your issues. Do get back to us with your results. I believe snapchat was just updated in the last week to fix its compatibility issues with Android 6.0 but I know there are many more that have not yet.

 

[daver68]

Kudos to you for trying basic troubleshooting steps and resolving your issue. A couple people here are only willing to complain and not willing to do anything to help themselves so that is refreshing to see.

Process of elimination is a great way to find out which of those apps was causing your issues. Do get back to us with your results. I believe snapchat was just updated in the last week to fix its compatibility issues with Android 6.0 but I know there are many more that have not yet.

Cannot emphasize this enough. Great to see that you've started with a clean slate and are continuing your testing. Please let us know how the next few days turn out!

 

[renton82]

Yes, of course!

 

[jimv1983]

Kudos to you for trying basic troubleshooting steps and resolving your issue. A couple people here are only willing to complain and not willing to do anything to help themselves so that is refreshing to see.

Process of elimination is a great way to find out which of those apps was causing your issues. Do get back to us with your results. I believe snapchat was just updated in the last week to fix its compatibility issues with Android 6.0 but I know there are many more that have not yet.

Some people come here because they need advise on what to try but don't get any real answers. Also, some of us realize that there are battery drain issues that are out of our control and are just venting our frustration of bad design decisions(mainly having such a tiny battery).

 

[bblzd]

Speaking of people who are only willing to complain and not willing to do anything to help themselves... is that more complaints I spy? That couldn't possibly be more refusal to help themselves because "drain is out of their control" could it? Say it ain't so! This is my shocked face.

I'm not sure if it's laziness, ignorance, or just plain stupidity but I'll never understand why some are only willing to go as far as typing angry paragraphs and call it a day. I guess I should be thankful though, without those folks I'd probably be out of a job.

We can't help those who aren't willing to help themselves.

 

[jimv1983]

Speaking of people who are only willing to complain and not willing to do anything to help themselves... is that more complaints I spy? That couldn't possibly be more refusal to help themselves because "drain is out of their control" could it? Say it ain't so! This is my shocked face.

I'm not sure if it's laziness, ignorance, or just plain stupidity but I'll never understand why some are only willing to go as far as typing angry paragraphs and call it a day. I guess I should be thankful though, without those folks I'd probably be out of a job.

We can't help those who aren't willing to help themselves.

If I could help myself fix the problem myself I wouldn't need to be here in the first place now would I?

I came here looking for a community of friendly and helpful people because I don't know what to do to fix this awful battery life (again, I wouldn't be here if I knew what to do). Instead I'm greeted by people that call me stupid for not knowing how to fix it myself and offer no help at all except solutions that basically suggest not using the phone at all. I thought this was a friendly and helpful community. I guess I was wrong.

There as also a bit of venting my frustration. Sorry if that bothered anyone. For something that cost me over $400 I was hoping for less hassle and that it would "just work".

 

[bblzd]

If I could help myself fix the problem myself I wouldn't need to be here in the first place now would I?

I came here looking for a community of friendly and helpful people because I don't know what to do to fix this awful battery life (again, I wouldn't be here if I knew what to do). Instead I'm greeted by people that call me stupid for not knowing how to fix it myself and offer no help at all except solutions that basically suggest not using the phone at all. I thought this was a friendly and helpful community. I guess I was wrong.

There as also a bit of venting my frustration. Sorry if that bothered anyone. For something that cost me over $400 I was hoping for less hassle and that it would "just work".

Can't help those who aren't willing to help themselves.

Key word willing. You're not willing to help yourself, you're not even willing to entertain the idea that one of your apps could be causing issues which is honestly laughable on a new Android release.

Quite frankly, I couldn't care less what anyone else's battery life is. However if someone were to demonstrate they're willing to learn and try and improve their situation then I'd certainly be willing to lend a hand.

However not only have you proven that you know very little on the subject, but you're also completely unwilling to learn. If you spent half as much effort researching as you did "venting" I'm sure you'd have resolved your issue by now.

Please do buy an iphone next time. It will get the same 2-3 hours screen time you see now but at least you won't have to deal with confusing battery statistics and rogue apps and can live in blissful ignorance. If you think a $400 Nexus phone should "just work", that's what the extra $500 that Apple charges is for.

 

[big_b0sss]

One of the worst result, what on earth is that Google connectivity services

 

[big_b0sss]

Never seen it before

 

[jimv1983]

Can't help those who aren't willing to help themselves.

Key word willing. You're not willing to help yourself, you're not even willing to entertain the idea that one of your apps could be causing issues which is honestly laughable on a new Android release.

Quite frankly, I couldn't care less what anyone else's battery life is. However if someone were to demonstrate they're willing to learn and try and improve their situation then I'd certainly be willing to lend a hand.

However not only have you proven that you know very little on the subject, but you're also completely unwilling to learn. If you spent half as much effort researching as you did "venting" I'm sure you'd have resolved your issue by now.

Please do buy an iphone next time. It will get the same 2-3 hours screen time you see now but at least you won't have to deal with confusing battery statistics and rogue apps and can live in blissful ignorance. If you think a $400 Nexus phone should "just work", that's what the extra $500 that Apple charges is for.

I am totally willing to take real suggestions. I wouldn't say I know "very little" on the subject but admittedly I'm not an expert(again, that's why I came here in the first place). If it was some rouge app shouldn't the battery usage show that? I'm seeing Chrome, Android OS and Screen as the top 3 battery users. Any third party app(any app that didn't ship with the phone) is why down the list. It would seem to me(just a guess on my part) that there is either no rogue app sucking battery or the battery usage of some app isn't being reported accurately. I even tried one of the very few real suggestions I got on here of trying a different browser(I tried Lightning which I didn't like too much and didn't really make a difference anyways) My screen brightness is at like 20% so that should limit some battery drain(although I'd prefer to have it at like 40-50%). According to the battery details my signal strength is pretty good so that shouldn't be hurting battery too much. I keep Location on battery saving so GPS isn't the problem.

I'm really trying to open to suggestions and trying to learn what the problem could be but I just haven't seen any reasonable suggestions (except for the trying a different browser suggestion which ended up not making any difference).

---------- Post added at 02:32 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:56 AM ----------

I´ve noticed ambient display keeps turning on and of even if the phone lays on the table with no notifications to display. Just tried to turn it of and my graph instantly showed straight line in the graph. Will test this overnight and let you guys know.

Do you have an app called LigthFlow installed. I noticed similar problems with ambient display when I had LightFlow installed. Once I uninstalled LightFlow the problem went away. Debating on turning off Ambient display and reinstalling LightFlow but that would require me to turn my screen on more often to see the time and notification details.

I'd kill for this type of battery... Off the charger since 10am. 25 minutes of SOT, 56 minutes of voice calls and 74% left

I feel your pain buddy. I'm having the same problem.

I feel like cellular signal is the biggest differentiator in SOT for most people. With mostly average signal (yellow or some orange in the signal graph), I get between 3.5 and a little over 4 hours of battery life. With mostly poor signal (orange and red), I get between 2.5 and 3 hours of SOT. Every single person I've seen post with 4.5 to 6.5 hours of SOT have multiple continuous hours of their day where they have great reception (green in the signal graph).

Probably 95% of my day the signal graph is green (either light green or dark green). I'm lucky if I can get 3.5 hours SOT and I'm not doing anything else that I would expect to use a lot of power(games, GPS nav, etc).

 

[Ezzy77]

One of the worst result, what on earth is that Google connectivity services

You seem to have a serious wake lock issue. Phone is clearly awake even though screen is off. That's not right.

 

[renton82]

I think i found the guilty! It'n not apps related!
It's my router in my shop!
At home i have a TP-Link Archer D5 with both 2,4 and 5 Ghz band enabled and my Nexus stay connected with 5 Ghz band (apart when i'm far from router and i stay connected with a TP-Link repeater at 2,4 Ghz).
In my shop i have a TP-Link 8980 Router with same 2,4 and 5 Ghz band and of course i connect always my nexus with 5 Ghz band. After many attempts, where my nexus was connected with 5 Ghz band and it had drained about 5% in a hour, i switch off 5 Ghz band and i connected it with 2,4 Ghz band; after about an hour it had lost only 1% with 2 whatsapp messages received.
Now, i don't know why it happened so, but there's something wrong (maybe some incomaptibility) with my router and Nexus 5X with 5 Ghz band...

Here you are the graph:

In the first part of the graph, as you can see, the line go down straight and the phone is alway stayed in standby with 5 Ghz band, in the small second part as you can see, the line became flat because i connected it with 2,4 Ghz band!

 

[jgummeson]

I think i found the guilty! It'n not apps related!
It's my router in my shop!
At home i have a TP-Link Archer D5 with both 2,4 and 5 Ghz band enabled and my Nexus stay connected with 5 Ghz band (apart when i'm far from router and i stay connected with a TP-Link repeater at 2,4 Ghz).
In my shop i have a TP-Link 8980 Router with same 2,4 and 5 Ghz band and of course i connect always my nexus with 5 Ghz band. After many attempts, where my nexus was connected with 5 Ghz band and it had drained about 5% in a hour, i switch off 5 Ghz band and i connected it with 2,4 Ghz band; after about an hour it had lost only 1% with 2 whatsapp messages received.
Now, i don't know why it happened so, but there's something wrong (maybe some incomaptibility) with my router and Nexus 5X with 5 Ghz band...

Here you are the graph:

In the first part of the graph, as you can see, the line go down straight and the phone is alway stayed in standby with 5 Ghz band, in the small second part as you can see, the line became flat because i connected it with 2,4 Ghz band!

Interesting. I have 5 Ghz at home. Don't use it anywhere else though. I tried switching my phone to 2.4 only so I'll see if that reduces my battery drain. I've seen other strange things with the WiFi on this phone. With WiFi switched off I sometimes still see WiFi constantly active in my battery usage. I guess there are some WiFi issues addressed in the MDB08M build, maybe battery drain will improve.

 

[daver68]

One of the worst result, what on earth is that Google connectivity services

From my understanding, Google Connectivity services is what lets your phone scan for WiFi networks (maybe other network types too?) even when your WiFi is not connected to a network or just "off". You know that option that says something like "Scan for networks even when WiFi is off"? I believe this is what the service does.

You can safely remove it or turn it off, I think. You might want to uninstall it and then re-install it, if network scanning is important to you. Here is the link to the app in the Play Store: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.gcs&hl=en

Maybe re-installing it might fix it? Dunno. But hopefully you better understand that the service is, and can take care of it.

In the first part of the graph, as you can see, the line go down straight and the phone is alway stayed in standby with 5 Ghz band, in the small second part as you can see, the line became flat because i connected it with 2,4 Ghz band!

By chance, is your router a 802.11ac or just a 802.11n?

I guess there are some WiFi issues addressed in the MDB08M build, maybe battery drain will improve.

Hmm, good point. Has anyone else had issues with 5GHz?

 

[renton82]

By chance, is your router a 802.11ac or just a 802.11n?

It's ac

 

[daver68]

Ah, I think then, your limiting it to 5GHz means it's on AC all the time and thus using more power for everything WiFi related.

While not technically the exact explanation, I typically generalize that AC will use more power than N would, N would use more power than G, and so on. It's like using LTE vs HSPA: LTE is faster but also uses more power.

If you leave it on 2.4GHz, or just Auto, you ought to have better battery life, as you've now attested to. Give it a few more days like this.

At the same time, keep on watching Doggcatcher and Audible, see how their battery use changes when you're using 2.4GHz/Auto. I doubt they'd change too much, but you never know!

 

[km8j]

Wtf. Google connectivity services showed up for me today also. 4 hours wakelock. What is that crap. I disabled the app. So far no issues. Should I expect any?

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