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Maximizing Nexus 4 battery charge cycles. Reducing battery capacity drop.

I've been following the great battery impression thread, which discusses ways to tweak the Nexus 4 settings, ROMs, and so forth for maximum run time between charging. This thread focuses on a different battery concern.
The Nexus 4 lithium polymer battery is sealed, and as far as I know, there are still several unknowns about replacing it. We've seen a tear-down showing how to remove the battery. However, as of now, few users have attempted it and there's not a consensus about how easy or difficult it is to do. Questions include:
Even with the correct tools, are the tabs that secure the Nexus 4's back prone to breakage, potentially leaving the case borked?
Is the battery difficult to extricate from its compartment?
Will it a high quality replacement battery become available inexpensively on eBay and elsewhere, or is it this battery, which was not designed to be user-replaceable, too much of an oddball for that to happen meaning that a replacement battery will be expensive and hard to find?
That said, the ease (or lack thereof) of replacing the Nexus 4's battery isn't what I've come here to discuss.
Given the unknowns about battery replacement, my concern is to how to maximize the Nexus 4 battery charge cycles and reduce the capacity drop of the battery over time. It could be bad if after just a year, the Nexus 4's capacity is already noticeably dropping. Not possible? I'm not so sure. Based on what I've read, it may depend upon how we handle charging.
This article at "Battery University" discusses the discharge characteristics of Lithium batteries, and it is my understanding that Lithium Polymer batteries, like the one in the Nexus 4 mirror these characteristics.
My takeaway from the article is:
Charging the Nexus 4 battery before it drops to less than 50% capacity will greatly increase the number of charge cycles before there's a noticeable capacity drop. Letting the battery nearly completely discharge will greatly reduce the number of charge cycles, and therefore greatly reduce the time before battery replacement will be necessary. (Table 2)
Inductive (wireless) charging, while convenient, generates extra heat that will over time reduce the recoverable capacity of the battery. (Table 3)
Having read this article, I am curious about the charging characteristics of the Nexus 4 and which, if any, charging variables we can control as users to maximize battery longevity.

When I first get a new smartphone I try to do a handful of full cycle charges before doing any partial charges. Your battery is still "new" and in the "break in" period. Many users that were the first to get theirs have reported their battery life as getting better. Of course a lot to do with battery are things like your data usage and what you have syncing.

RealiZms said:
When I first get a new smartphone I try to do a handful of full cycle charges before doing any partial charges. Your battery is still "new" and in the "break in" period. Many users that were the first to get theirs have reported their battery life as getting better. Of course a lot to do with battery are things like your data usage and what you have syncing.
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Thanks, but I will again clarify that that I created this thread to discuss maximizing the Nexus 4 battery's long-term life and recoverable capacity, not maximizing run-down time in the short-term. That is already being discussed extensively in the great battery impression thread.

I have had a lot of experience with LiIon batteries over the years and I can tell you that the enemy of them is both inactivity and deep discharge use.
Use your phone as you normally would, but avoid frequent deep discharges. Don't be afraid about the number of charge cycles. Frequent charges are better than deep discharge cycles.
These pups have been designed to be used the way most folks use frequently used rechargeable devices. Pop it on the charger when you can, even if you know it won't be there long enough to be topped off. The more frequent and varied activity the better.

I'll add that I do not currently see an LG BL-T5 Nexus 4 replacement battery sold anywhere.

FYI - The Nexus 4 uses an 800 cycle battery as well so makes it even less of a thing to worry about. My SGS2 still gives me good battery life and it's more than 1yr old already, and i think that is a 300 cycle battery. Remember also that at that 800 cycle mark the battery should still have 80% of it's original capacity. 800 cycles is more than 2yrs of constant use/charge every night and for people that don't so much that could put you in the 3yr-4yr range. If you still have this phone 4yrs from now, i think you wont need to complain if it "only" has 80% of it's original charge.

Hi
borntochill said:
I've been following the great battery impression thread, which discusses ways to tweak the Nexus 4 settings, ROMs, and so forth for maximum run time between charging. This thread focuses on a different battery concern.
The Nexus 4 lithium polymer battery is sealed, and as far as I know, there are still several unknowns about replacing it. We've seen a tear-down showing how to remove the battery. However, as of now, few users have attempted it and there's not a consensus about how easy or difficult it is to do. Questions include:
Even with the correct tools, are the tabs that secure the Nexus 4's back prone to breakage, potentially leaving the case borked?
Is the battery difficult to extricate from its compartment?
Will it a high quality replacement battery become available inexpensively on eBay and elsewhere, or is it this battery, which was not designed to be user-replaceable, too much of an oddball for that to happen meaning that a replacement battery will be expensive and hard to find?
That said, the ease (or lack thereof) of replacing the Nexus 4's battery isn't what I've come here to discuss.
Given the unknowns about battery replacement, my concern is to how to maximize the Nexus 4 battery charge cycles and reduce the capacity drop of the battery over time. It could be bad if after just a year, the Nexus 4's capacity is already noticeably dropping. Not possible? I'm not so sure. Based on what I've read, it may depend upon how we handle charging.
This article at "Battery University" discusses the discharge characteristics of Lithium batteries, and it is my understanding that Lithium Polymer batteries, like the one in the Nexus 4 mirror these characteristics.
My takeaway from the article is:
Charging the Nexus 4 battery before it drops to less than 50% capacity will greatly increase the number of charge cycles before there's a noticeable capacity drop. Letting the battery nearly completely discharge will greatly reduce the number of charge cycles, and therefore greatly reduce the time before battery replacement will be necessary. (Table 2)
Inductive (wireless) charging, while convenient, generates extra heat that will over time reduce the recoverable capacity of the battery. (Table 3)
Having read this article, I am curious about the charging characteristics of the Nexus 4 and which, if any, charging variables we can control as users to maximize battery longevity.
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There is little point in worrying about charging before it's discharged to 50% and/or not charging to maximum. Yes it increases the number of cycles, but is reducing runtime between those cycles, so you have to charge it twice as often using up the extra cycles gained, so overall it tends to even out.
The longevity argument for only partial discharges really only applies at the time of design and specification where the manufacturer can spec a larger battery and sacrifice some of the capacity (by only charging say from 30 to 70%) to get extra charge cycles. Clearly with a mobile phone this isn't desirable to do, as we crave all the the runtime we can get in the smallest form factor possible.
Regards
Phil

shotta35 said:
FYI - The Nexus 4 uses an 800 cycle battery as well so makes it even less of a thing to worry about. My SGS2 still gives me good battery life and it's more than 1yr old already, and i think that is a 300 cycle battery. Remember also that at that 800 cycle mark the battery should still have 80% of it's original capacity. 800 cycles is more than 2yrs of constant use/charge every night and for people that don't so much that could put you in the 3yr-4yr range. If you still have this phone 4yrs from now, i think you wont need to complain if it "only" has 80% of it's original charge.
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Is the "800 cycle" rating is based on real world usage, or a set of idealized laboratory conditions that few users will actually meet? Many Nexus 4 forum users are reporting running down their batteries to a discharge depth exceeding 90% on a daily basis before recharging. This will dramatically reduce their battery's number of charge cycles. The "800 cycle" rating is only useful if we know the conditions upon which it was tested.

PhilipL said:
Hi
There is little point in worrying about charging before it's discharged to 50% and/or not charging to maximum. Yes it increases the number of cycles, but is reducing runtime between those cycles, so you have to charge it twice as often using up the extra cycles gained, so overall it tends to even out.
The longevity argument for only partial discharges really only applies at the time of design and specification where the manufacturer can spec a larger battery and sacrifice some of the capacity (by only charging say from 30 to 70%) to get extra charge cycles. Clearly with a mobile phone this isn't desirable to do, as we crave all the the runtime we can get in the smallest form factor possible.
Regards
Phil
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Point taken, although it looks to me like the relationship between discharge depth and maximum number of charge cycles is not linear. From the way I read it, frequent deep discharging can markedly impact battery longevity which is why I'm skeptical of the 800 cycle figure. Given that many Nexus 4 users are currently reporting an inability to make it through a full day without completely draining their battery, those particular users are bound to have shortened battery longevity unless they charge at least twice/day.

Hi
borntochill said:
Point taken, although it looks to me like the relationship between discharge depth and maximum number of charge cycles is not linear. From the way I read it, frequent deep discharging can markedly impact battery longevity which is why I'm skeptical of the 800 cycle figure. Given that many Nexus 4 users are currently reporting an inability to make it through a full day without completely draining their battery, those particular users are bound to have shortened battery longevity unless they charge at least twice/day.
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Yes it isn't linear, but the advantages are also outweighed by the negatives, such as having to plug it in more often to charge, and if people are struggling to get through the day now on a full charge/discharge cycle.....
The 800 cycle figure is probably about right for chemistry used in the LG Nexus, and most of us will have replaced our phone in a couple of years anyway long before we start to notice the lowered battery life.
The other thing with a lithium batteries is they are like perishable foods, even if we don't use them much, after a few years the capacity has diminished anyway. So even if we only charged the phone twice in two years, the third charge capacity would probably not be that much different to having charged it every day for two years.
So we shouldn't worry about the battery, the best thing we can do is use it as much as possible as it is going to degrade anyway, and we will see little benefit from treating it with kit gloves.
The above also assumes the battery can never be replaced. It certainly is replaceable by the manufacturer or a repair centre, and more than likely most of us could manage a replacement ourselves.
Regards
Phil

One very important thing to realize is that these 500/800 or whatever hundred cycles it's talking about is not how many times it can be charged, period.
It's not like after the 500th or 800th charge, this battery can never be powered on again.
Read the article closely:
" the number of discharge/charge cycles Li-ion can deliver at various DoD levels before the battery capacity drops to 70 percent."
Also, if you lower the voltage of the charge, it seems battery long term life greatly increases:
"Most Li-ions are charged to 4.20V/cell and every reduction of 0.10V/cell is said to double cycle life. For example, a lithium-ion cell charged to 4.20V/cell typically delivers 300–500 cycles. If charged to only 4.10V/cell, the life can be prolonged to 600–1,000 cycles; 4.00V/cell should deliver 1,200–2,000 and 3.90V/cell 2,400–4,000 cycles. Table 4 summarizes these results. The values are estimate and depend on the type of li-ion-ion battery."

Hi
borntochill said:
Is the "800 cycle" rating is based on real world usage, or a set of idealized laboratory conditions that few users will actually meet? Many Nexus 4 forum users are reporting running down their batteries to a discharge depth exceeding 90% on a daily basis before recharging. This will dramatically reduce their battery's number of charge cycles. The "800 cycle" rating is only useful if we know the conditions upon which it was tested.
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Click to collapse
When a lithium battery is fully discharged, it isn't actually completely discharged. LG like other manufacturers will have programmed a level that shows 0% on the phone before it shuts down, but in reality this might still leave 10% or 20% or 2% capacity in reserve, we don't know the figure, but presumably LG have set both full and empty charge points to ensure we see around 800 cycles.
Regards
Phil
---------- Post added at 09:19 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:10 PM ----------
Hi
ksc6000 said:
Also, if you lower the voltage of the charge, it seems battery long term life greatly increases:
"Most Li-ions are charged to 4.20V/cell and every reduction of 0.10V/cell is said to double cycle life. For example, a lithium-ion cell charged to 4.20V/cell typically delivers 300–500 cycles. If charged to only 4.10V/cell, the life can be prolonged to 600–1,000 cycles; 4.00V/cell should deliver 1,200–2,000 and 3.90V/cell 2,400–4,000 cycles. Table 4 summarizes these results. The values are estimate and depend on the type of li-ion-ion battery."
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Yes you get more cycles, but because you have a battery with reduced capacity, you are having to charge it more. Overall the benefit isn't as great as the numbers make it. If LG wanted to give us 1600 cycles they could lower the charge voltages, but then the battery capacity would have to be advertised at around 1050mAh, meaning it lasts half the time it does now, and will need charging around twice as often.
For a mobile phone with a typical 2 year life span, the priority is to maximum the time between charges while ensuring the battery lasts the typical 2 years of most peoples phone contracts. It isn't a co-incidence that 800 charges works out as a bit over 2 years if you charge every day.
We don't need to worry about the battery, just enjoy using the phone. Also the battery doesn't just stop working at 800 cycles either, it just doesn't hold as much charge, but capacity is lost anyway over time regardless if you use it or not as lithium batteries start to age the moment they are made.
Regards
Phil

PhilipL said:
For a mobile phone with a typical 2 year life span, the priority is to maximum the time between charges while ensuring the battery lasts the typical 2 years of most peoples phone contracts. It isn't a co-incidence that 800 charges works out as a bit over 2 years if you charge every day.
We don't need to worry about the battery, just enjoy using the phone.
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A lot of assumptions there, Phil.
My "priorities" and LG's differ. 2 years from now, some will replace their Nexus 4 with whatever shiny new phone comes along that offers holographic video projection chat and does double duty as a sex robot. However, I will happily trudge on with my Nexus 4 for between 3 to 5 years which is how long I typically own a phone before replacement. I don't need bleeding edge, especially if the bleeding edge is a menstruating sex robot phone. Just sayin'.
We don't know if the Nexus 4 battery replacement will turn out to be either very costly and/or difficult. For those of us who don't plan to toss our Nexus 4 into a landfill two years from now, it pays to know what measures we can take to prolong battery longevity.

'Maximizing Nexus 4 battery'
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'Menstruating sex robot'
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Hmmmm....how did that happen...

I don't know if we will really know how good the battery longevity is in this thing until the device is a year old or more. Lithium polymer technology varies a lot. There have been a lot of advances with this tech in the last few years and some companies claim to have developed manufacturing techniques that allow THOUSANDS of charge before noticeable drops in batty capacity. Other technologies developed include the tech Apple uses and advertised in its MacBook line a few years ago that claimed longer battery life and very fast charging compared to Lithium Ion batteries. It all varies. LG claims to have some special tech baked into this battery that allows it to charge to a higher voltage compared to batteries of similar size, but I don't know how long its life is rated at.

666fff said:
'Maximizing Nexus 4 battery'
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'Menstruating sex robot'
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Hmmmm....how did that happen...
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You apparently haven't seen the leaked mock-up of the Nexus 6.

borntochill said:
You apparently haven't seen the leaked mock-up of the Nexus 6.
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I would consider an early upgrade for a menstruating Daryl Hannah any day

Longest batterylife (8 times longer) information! *Easy, takes 30 seconds to learn*

If the battery is only charged to about 75% it will last about 8 times more discharge cycles then if it was charged to 100% every time. Which is pretty damn much!
100% charge gives 350-400 Discharge cycles.
75% charge gives 2400-4000 Discharge cycles.
Source and good read with more tips how to treat your battery good:
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries
I don't know of any app or kernel that does this automatically, if you know or can program one please update this thread.
Meanwhile we have to just unplug charger by ourselves at around 70-75%
Please press thanks and write a reply what you think if this information was usefull to you!:good:

Well, if it's true, it's a huge improvement for only 25%, we can perfectly last a full day with 75% of battery

This is really good battery info. Thanks.
My personal view on the matter is for 15 bucks, I'd rather pick up a replacement battery a year or two from now when I may need it and just replace the cell rather than work to keep my phone charged closer to 75 percent every day in order to see some of the par-charge benefit the article discusses. I'm not suggesting that should be your position.
Based on how I use my phone, starting nearly every day closer to 75 percent than a full charge, I'm guaranteed to run to shutdown many more days than I would if I accumulated the expected number of full cycles. There's enough indicators to tip you off when you reach end-of-life on your cell: you usually see very significant shortened battery life and/or big cliffs in useage like draining evenly say between 100 and 78 percent and then going from 78 to 60, and then even depletion again usually indicates cells failing. Point is batteries don't go from good to bad overnight.
My perspective after just very recently moving into an S5 from a RAZR Maxx that required a good bit of phone disassembly to get to that battery, picking up a $15.00 replacement and keeping my battery topped off is the way to go. :good:

I have never had to replace a phone battery, they have always lasted until I upgrade. Great read but it seems the author was mainly referring to laptop batteries.

kgyirhj said:
If the battery is only charged to about 75% it will last about 8 times more discharge cycles then if it was charged to 100% every time. Which is pretty damn much!
100% charge gives 350-400 Discharge cycles.
75% charge gives 2400-4000 Discharge cycles.
Source and good read with more tips how to treat your battery good:
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries
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Click to collapse
Be careful with info from batteryuniversity.com. It is largely geared towards engineers using raw cells, not users of consumer devices. This leads to people making incorrect assumptions. For example you may read there about the dangers of discharging Li-ion cells too far. But your device probably (if the engineers have any brains) already builds in some buffer, and shuts off/refuses to power on if it's a safe level above that. It's hard for us to know what levels Samsung considers empty and full in comparison to the actual cells.
I'm not saying this is bad advice, just that it may not really make that much of a difference in reality, and it's tough to do in practice.

my girlfriends S3 is 2 years old now and battery lasts still the same long as it was new.

i think phones anyway doesn't charge the battery to 100% full capacity or even let it discharge to 0%

Anyone tested this to see if it works better for battery performance?

Maybe if I had something like a HTC One I might do that because you have to be like a freaking safe cracker just to get at the battery, but on S5 I'll just keep going to 100% and buy a new battery after 9 months because I am a heavy user and lose a lot of capacity within a year.

Be careful with info from batteryuniversity.com. It is largely geared towards engineers using raw cells, not users of consumer devices. This leads to people making incorrect assumptions. For example you may read there about the dangers of discharging Li-ion cells too far. But your device probably (if the engineers have any brains) already builds in some buffer, and shuts off/refuses to power on if it's a safe level above that. It's hard for us to know what levels Samsung considers empty and full in comparison to the actual cells.
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thanks for the great info mate .
your input was needed.

It's just click bait, chances of keeping the phone for 4000 cycles is 0 for me.

battery capacity, misleading, wrong, or it's me...

Supposedly... The battery on our Google Nexus 6 has a capacity of 3220 mAh.
Specs
BATTERY Non-removable Li-Po 3220 mAh battery
Stand-by Up to 330 h
Talk time Up to 24 h
I purchased a current, voltage, detection tool http://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00NNGK4QS?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00
made by SainSonic.
Okay, I know this isn't a fluke meter quality and standard, but how come when I charge my phone from i.e. 20% battery capacity left, to reach a full charge the Sainsonic USB tool reports back with a supplied mAH of approximately 1500mah to reach a 100% charge.
Are we to assume the battery capacity supplied by motorola for the Nexus 6 phone to be rigged or false? Is this another one of those cases, where your mileage will vary b.s.
I know the USB detection tool is not a Mil Spec device, but, how can it report back this off of factual value or reading?
Cheers
LormaD

2nd test
OK, so I let the phone on, til the phone did it's own shut down. I even rebooted the phone into Recovery mode, where it eventually powered off, 2x. I know this is bad and not recommended for a battery, but I wanted to try to deplete the battery completely, and using the turbo charger, charge the phone and get a mAH consumption to refill the battery.
From an empty charge to maximum, I recorded 1825mAH. I am unsure, if by TURBO charging the phone, whether I am not registering a true milliamp draw and count. My last test, will take place doing the same thing, but using a standard NON turbo charger to see whether or not this reports a difference or not.
Cheers

That meter does say that it's for between 3 and 7 volts which is pretty much saying it's made for a standard 5V usb spec current. The turbo charger uses voltages of 12, 9 and 5 volts to accomplish its faster charging speed and the charging voltage only goes down to 5V once the battery is almost full somewhere like 75% iirc.
Though it also wouldn't surprise me if the turbo charger doesn't turbo charge when running through that meter. Might check and see if the phone charges any slower when you switch to the normal charger test.

While Charging, the USB meter does show it's outputting voltage as well. AND, while charging I do have the phone using an app like Ampere so I do see that it is in fact indicating TURBO mode. But logically, the phone does complete it's charger in under 2 hours, hence it is charging very quickly = same as turbo charging.
1) It is in fact Turbo Charging. 2) The outputting voltage, even though is variable (from 5 to 9 volts in the case of Turbo Charging) would only relate to varying the mAH per / Sec if you will, from a quicker or slower "Consumption" (i.o.w. if it is quick charging, the rate of supplied mAH is faster than slow charging, so the total amount or capacity of charge is the same, it is just a matter of how quickly can you refill the empty bucket of water, with water).
I am using the Pure Nexus Project Nexus 6 Rom, flashed with the latest Radio, and I am extremely happy and very stable build (so much so, I even sent beans some props and thank$you donation). What I am disappointed with (even with previous roms and build from 5 all the way to 6) is the battery capacity (I loved the Turbo Charging so much, I did away with carrying a battery bank and purchased a 2nd Turbo Charger for the office). I did not purchase the phone new, but did get it in an almost new state (purchased from the typical, "I got to dump this just came out phone and get the latest released phone" type of tech junkie). FWIW, it is the 64gb model, and about 6 months old (I have the google bill showing the manufacturing date and sell date). I can't say I am impressed with the overall battery capacity of this phone, but it is designed to get me through a day 90% of the time, so I am never really worry free, it simply not a tank like some other monster phones that I have had (I like smartphones with a minimum of 6" of screen, my previous phone was the Samsung Galaxy Mega 6.3).
I will be honest, I have always been a battery junkie from my days as a Radiocomm R&D department tech, so I have a carryover Battery Analyzer (5K $ piece of bench equipment) that I can use for most of my battery related equipment (from battery powered yard tools, commercial grade walky talkies to household products like cordless home phones). But things like cellphones would not work, because I do not have the correct adaptor that has the correct resistance type, delta voltages, and connect-ability. In most cases if I jerry rig something (like I was curious to know what the capacity of an Energizer D size battery was compared to a Duracel D size Alkaline Battery capacity was, I could read the output mAH capacity from either battery and know which does really last longer) I can get the output capacity but cannot perform a 3x count battery analysis (which basically performs a full charge discharge 3 times in a row and spits out the 3 capacities back) which in fact I would NOT do on a Lithium battery for obvious reasons.

Battery mods have terrible battery life?

I've been using both the incipio offgrid, and tumi powerpack battery mods (both are wireless charging variants) and have noticed just awful battery life. from 100% it charges my phone up maybe 15-20 percent, and thats with the screen off, just streaming music. If I'm using the phone (just surfing the web or instagram) the battery dies in around 30-45 minutes, is this normal? I expected alot more out of these. I can just stare at the notification bar and watch as the battery drops, my software is up to date, and I was just wondering if this is normal? Is everyone else getting this awful performance? I expected way more for like 70-80 bucks each...

Sky's Divide said:
I've been using both the incipio offgrid, and tumi powerpack battery mods (both are wireless charging variants) and have noticed just awful battery life. from 100% it charges my phone up maybe 15-20 percent, and thats with the screen off, just streaming music. If I'm using the phone (just surfing the web or instagram) the battery dies in around 30-45 minutes, is this normal? I expected alot more out of these. I can just stare at the notification bar and watch as the battery drops, my software is up to date, and I was just wondering if this is normal? Is everyone else getting this awful performance? I expected way more for like 70-80 bucks each...
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This is not normal. While I don't have either of these, based on the reading I've done and reports I've seen from people who do, the Incipio off grid should be able to charge your phone up 50-75% when attached. Not sure if you have some crazy wakelock that's keeping your CPU maxed out all the time or what, but dying in 30-40 minutes makes no sense.

xxBrun0xx said:
This is not normal. While I don't have either of these, based on the reading I've done and reports I've seen from people who do, the Incipio off grid should be able to charge your phone up 50-75% when attached. Not sure if you have some crazy wakelock that's keeping your CPU maxed out all the time or what, but dying in 30-40 minutes makes no sense.
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Click to collapse
When I got it to die In 30-40 min I was on a phone call and surfing instagram. Took the tumi out yesterday with 80% battery in it and had my phones screen off streaming music over Bluetooth. The phone charged up about 25% before the battery pack died. Any ideas on how I could improve the battery life? My moto mods manager is up to date and I don't get any prompts to update anything whenever I snap on the mods

I was surprised when I found this post, so I checked how many percent of battery do I get with a my incipio battery mod. I plugged the mod, my phone's battery was at 15% and the battery mod was at 100%.
Now the Incipio battery mod is empty and my phone's battery is at 50%. So it charged my phone by 35%.
Pretty disappointing for a 2220 mAh battery that costs almost 100€ ...

To me the best use of the mod is to snap it on when the Moto Z Play is fully charged and to chose the option to keep the phone battery at 80%. With normal use, i've seen the mod keep the phone at 80% for up to a day. To me the mod is not meant to charge the phone but more to keep it from discharging.

To me the idea of the battery mod makes no sense.
There is an Aukey 16000 mAh power pack with QuickCharge 3.0 available which boosts the battery in nearly no time. I paid less than 20 Euro.
Who needs such a battery mod with a Moto Z Play which lasts all day under heavy usage?
Who needs such a battery mod when power packs are big, cheap and fast?
Who even needs the power pack if you have a wall outlet with a QuickCharge 3.0 charger boosting the battery percentage in no time? I needed that power pack when the previous phone (Moto X Play) had some hardware defect making it lose power.
Edit: These questions are meant honestly. Are you living in the desert for several days and can't afford to carry a bag?

tag68 said:
To me the idea of the battery mod makes no sense.
There is an Aukey 16000 mAh power pack with QuickCharge 3.0 available which boosts the battery in nearly no time. I paid less than 20 Euro.
Who needs such a battery mod with a Moto Z Play which lasts all day under heavy usage?
Who needs such a battery mod when power packs are big, cheap and fast?
Who even needs the power pack if you have a wall outlet with a QuickCharge 3.0 charger boosting the battery percentage in no time? I needed that power pack when the previous phone (Moto X Play) had some hardware defect making it lose power.
Edit: These questions are meant honestly. Are you living in the desert for several days and can't afford to carry a bag?
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The battery mods are not particularly useful for the Z Play because if you charge every night, you have basically unlimited battery life. Battery packs are extremely useful for the regular Z, though, which has extremely poor battery life on its own. They're basically mandatory for the Z.

I'm shocked that battery mods can only charge your internal battery and can't be used directly (discharging the mod battery instead of the internal battery), the same way Thinkpads that have more than one battery can do. That makes the $80 (vs maybe $10 for a 2000 mah ravpower) cost all the more eyebrow-raising.
I'd love to use them as a way of preserving the sealed in internal battery's longevity, making the internal battery the backup battery and wearing out the easily replaceable, easily swappable mods instead.

fortunz said:
I'd love to use them as a way of preserving the sealed in internal battery's longevity,
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What do you think how a battery should be treated to prolong its lifetime?
This is a serious question. I'm not sure if charging cycles do matter these days. The point which makes batteries getting weak is the age. An additional battery will not help reduce the age.
Of course you should be careful not to be in extreme cold or heat. If the battery is below 30 percent, you should consider to charge it. You should not charge it again if it's over 80 percent. But trying not to use it seems not to really be helpful for the battery to have a longer life, although battery lifetime usually is given in battery cycles. At least this is my experience. If it does not get hot when used or charged, all batteries nowadays start getting weaker a bit after about 2 years, it gets really recognizable after 4 years, and when they are 6-8 years old, they get so low that they may not fulfill there purpose anymore. Cycles? Never recognized any influence for the lifetime. But one hot day with a usage above average where the battery gets hot may really cause a recognizable decrease in capacity.
If you have some source comparing battery lifetime for different use cases (storage, low usage, middle usage, frequent usage, under different conditions of temperature, fast charge and slow charge) I'd be really interested.

tag68 said:
What do you think how a battery should be treated to prolong its lifetime?
This is a serious question. I'm not sure if charging cycles do matter these days. The point which makes batteries getting weak is the age. An additional battery will not help reduce the age.
Of course you should be careful not to be in extreme cold or heat. If the battery is below 30 percent, you should consider to charge it. You should not charge it again if it's over 80 percent. But trying not to use it seems not to really be helpful for the battery to have a longer life, although battery lifetime usually is given in battery cycles. At least this is my experience. If it does not get hot when used or charged, all batteries nowadays start getting weaker a bit after about 2 years, it gets really recognizable after 4 years, and when they are 6-8 years old, they get so low that they may not fulfill there purpose anymore. Cycles? Never recognized any influence for the lifetime. But one hot day with a usage above average where the battery gets hot may really cause a recognizable decrease in capacity.
If you have some source comparing battery lifetime for different use cases (storage, low usage, middle usage, frequent usage, under different conditions of temperature, fast charge and slow charge) I'd be really interested.
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Same sources as you, personal experience and basic knowledge (battery life being measured in cycles). I'm not even completely worried about average aging, but out of a batch of millions of batteries, plenty will start to experience rapid discharge early, even without abnormal heat, not to the point of being completely dead, but certainly no longer tolerable. Today's phone batteries might actually tolerate heat better than in the past, having been built for quick charging, which is the hottest a sd625 seems to get.
I've read manuals and battery university and a few tech blog articles all of which have differing advice, just like you and me, but I have yet to find a source I find credible (based on diverse large scale testing not limited anecdotal evidence or in the case of manuals, insanely outdated nicad-era stuff). And, sincerely no offense intended, I'm unlikely to decide cycles don't matter and weight your anecdotal evidence over mine anymore than you'd weight mine over yours. But if you ever find a good source with those comparisons, I'd be pleased to check it out too.

tag68 said:
Who needs such a battery mod with a Moto Z Play which lasts all day under heavy usage?
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Because I'm a very heavy user of my phone and don't want to worry about power even if I can't get to a outlet during the day.
Who needs such a battery mod when power packs are big, cheap and fast?
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Because the bat mod is easy to slap on and keep on all the time (when I'm not using a different mod). Then I never have to worry about taking the pack with me or not or carrying the extra cable with me or not.
Who even needs the power pack if you have a wall outlet with a QuickCharge 3.0 charger boosting the battery percentage in no time?
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Because I don't want to have to worry about having the charger with me or finding a spot to charge.
I fully admit that I tend to be more paranoid about running out of power than I need to be, but I like to be secure knowing that I should have more than enough battery life, even if I can't charge overnight. I like to know that I can grab my phone at any point of the day and walk out the door with it without having to worry about taking a charger with me.

RedRamage said:
I fully admit that I tend to be more paranoid about running out of power than I need to be, but I like to be secure knowing that I should have more than enough battery life, even if I can't charge overnight. I like to know that I can grab my phone at any point of the day and walk out the door with it without having to worry about taking a charger with me.
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I quite like just not having to charge for three days. I have the battery mod which I use on the efficiency mode, and I got over a full day out of it. At the end of day three I had nearly 30% battery left. Probably enough for most of one more day.
The other thing for me is using wireless charging. I like just slapping my phone on a stand overnight when I do charge it. It charges slowly, yes, but it doesn't matter if I am charging overnight. I still have access to the quick charger if I need to get a full battery quick!

I use mine on my motorcycle where I'm riding for 10 hours a day. I'm at about 50% in 4 hours and dead by 7 or 8, so I'm hoping with the additional battery MOD that I can get at least 12 hours charge. I'm really bad about remembering to plug my phone in when I stop for a break!

@tag68 : dude I think you totally missed to read what @fortunz was saying, he was only pointing that he would like the Mods to be used as a primary source battery instead of being a "ultra-portable power bank".
Given that there is also a fraction of the power being lost in the form of heat, during charge/transfer, it is even more silly from Motorola not to have the battery used directly. I can say by the 25-35% charge from the Mods estimated from other users, that the efficiency is somewhere around 50%, HORRIBLE to say the least.
And yeah I was reading through both of your posts and good information was provided, although unnecessary friction used (not naming anyone).
I actually have kind of the same idea from @fortunz to prolong the battery life of my Z-play even with the mod just being a power bank.
Saying that the mods (~2220mah) charge your phone anywhere between 25-35%, I can actually take the top 25-35% out of my internal battery use and move it to the Mod.
So I can charge my phone up to 70% before going to bed, and then when my phone reaches 30% during the use next day, I'll just slap the mod.
I can allow myself a lot of variation to this, I will not be religious about it, the topic is to avoid hitting 100% charge, and instead, moving the wear of that 30% usage to the Mod.
According, to many articles, citing just one below, considering the depth of discharges and voltage levels, you guys might do the equation if you like, but according to the charts and theory:
charging my phone twice a day trying not to exceed 70%, will give me WAY more longevity run than charging up to 100% every day.
First charge will be from around 15% which is my normal deadline to around 70% with a wall charger, before going to bed.
Second charge will be from the mod from around 30% to around 60% (hopefully), which will give me portability while charging.
Total screen on time during the day, should be around 10% less, but well worth and I can definitely take the hit if getting more battery longevity as a trade.
Source:
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries
Huh, it even makes sense when explaining to other people...

In re: friction, I took no offense from the exchange. Hopefully I didn't cause any either.
Good luck with your efforts. I have considered using this app to to stop charging early: https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/apps-games/root-battery-charge-limit-t3557002 Haven't started using it yet.

fortunz said:
In re: friction, I took no offense from the exchange. Hopefully I didn't cause any either.
Good luck with your efforts. I have considered using this app to to stop charging early: https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/apps-games/root-battery-charge-limit-t3557002 Haven't started using it yet.
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Sadly that application requires root... and I don't want to unlock the bootloader and then having to worry about SafetyNet...

For me SafetyNet is green using Magisk 12.0 as root solution, but that may change of course. But it would help for the battery.
Short rant about this topic: It is strange that the owner of a device can be forbidden to restrict the charging. You bought it, you should be able to do these things with it. Introducing SafetyNet is a bad idea by Google. Security should be made by algorithms, not by hardware. Using public key anyone may modify anything, and you can still assure the content to be trustworthy. There no need to prove the Android not to be modified, it is just a bad idea, unnecessary restricting the user. Owner.

tag68 said:
For me SafetyNet is green using Magisk 12.0 as root solution, but that may change of course. But it would help for the battery.
Short rant about this topic: It is strange that the owner of a device can be forbidden to restrict the charging. You bought it, you should be able to do these things with it. Introducing SafetyNet is a bad idea by Google. Security should be made by algorithms, not by hardware. Using public key anyone may modify anything, and you can still assure the content to be trustworthy. There no need to prove the Android not to be modified, it is just a bad idea, unnecessary restricting the user. Owner.
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Well said
Thanks for the tip! I'll have it mind!
At the moment I don't feel like unlocking the bootloader because I'm planning to use the moto Mods and these can't be used with custom ROMs yet, and I have no use for root other than changing the work mode on Greenify but it already works well enough in No-Root mode, so for me there is no true benefit.

A good resource for lithium batteries are rc helicopter forums. Helis use speed controllers of many tens of amps, drain the batteries in minutes versus days to low levels and charge them at high speed. What reduces their life is heat, overcharging the voltage or over discharging the voltage. They do not age if left in a partial charge. You can let them sit for years unused and they will lose very little capacity. If you only run them at 70%cycle, they last about 3000 cycles.

Well, that was weird.
Phone at 9%, mophie mod at 100%. Put it on, barely used the phone (even took a nap). About an hour later, the mophie mod is at 50%, but the phone actually went down to 8%. Took off the mod and the phone went immediately to 4%. Ouch.
Mod normally works fine. It'll keep the phone at 80% for most of the day just fine. Not sure what was going on.

best wireless charger for Exynos Galaxy Note 8 for US shopper

What's the best wireless charger (also, if possible, one cheaper than Samsung's) for the Galaxy Note 8 Exynos variant? I'm shopping for accessories for it in the US, and am not sure about if ones meant for the Qualcomm version are compatible or the best at charging it.

PloniAlmoni said:
What's the best wireless charger (also, if possible, one cheaper than Samsung's) for the Galaxy Note 8 Exynos variant? I'm shopping for accessories for it in the US, and am not sure about if ones meant for the Qualcomm version are compatible or the best at charging it.
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I use the Tylt Vu wireless charger on my Note 8. I used this charger previously on my Motorola Nexus 6, and it works great on both phones. Beware of buying it on ebay or other non-official websites. The prices sometimes are greater than buying it at the Tylt Vu website: https://www.tylt.com/
They make several products, and the one I use and recommend is the Vu, because it is only $30.00 and it holds the phone at a 45 degree angle. This is perfect for working, surfing, etc. because if you get a notification, you simply glance at the phone and see it easily. The Vu also charges the phone while it is on, and the battery gains on its percentage. I find this to be a great advantage because it makes the battery last a long time. Deep drain cycles kill lithium-ions and with wireless charging that gains, you never get below 90%. When I go on the road, the phone maybe goes down to 70%, but that's not a big deal. A big deal is when it starts going below 50%. The closer it gets to 0%, the deeper the discharge cycle and the more the chemistry inside the battery changes to be unusable.

Huele Fello said:
I use the Tylt Vu wireless charger on my Note 8. I used this charger previously on my Motorola Nexus 6, and it works great on both phones. Beware of buying it on ebay or other non-official websites. The prices sometimes are greater than buying it at the Tylt Vu website: https://www.tylt.com/
They make several products, and the one I use and recommend is the Vu, because it is only $30.00 and it holds the phone at a 45 degree angle. This is perfect for working, surfing, etc. because if you get a notification, you simply glance at the phone and see it easily. The Vu also charges the phone while it is on, and the battery gains on its percentage. I find this to be a great advantage because it makes the battery last a long time. Deep drain cycles kill lithium-ions and with wireless charging that gains, you never get below 90%. When I go on the road, the phone maybe goes down to 70%, but that's not a big deal. A big deal is when it starts going below 50%. The closer it gets to 0%, the deeper the discharge cycle and the more the chemistry inside the battery changes to be unusable.
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That's interesting, I read somewhere else that 35% is the best amount to discharge a phone to before recharging, and was a bit concerned about what a wireless charger would do for that. Apparently that's wrong?

PloniAlmoni said:
That's interesting, I read somewhere else that 35% is the best amount to discharge a phone to before recharging, and was a bit concerned about what a wireless charger would do for that. Apparently that's wrong?
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From my point of view it's wrong. There could be some circumstances where the 35% is correct, but in general it is best to not discharge batteries down to those levels too many times, because the discharge cycle changes the chemistry inside the battery such that it doesn't accept the full amount of charge that it accepted prior to the deep discharge. The chemistry changes significantly when you deep discharge down to the single digit percentages and less as as you go up to 50%. My batteries have discharged deeply in the past but they were few and far between. I speculate that when I sold my Nexus 6 about 1.5 months ago, its battery capacity was about 98% due to my careful diligence.
Now why should you take my word on this? I can ask you the same question about the 35%. Why should you take his word on it? My opinion comes from decades of electrical engineering work, mostly in programmable devices and ASIC development, but some of it is in testing. I was hired as a consultant to test batteries for aircraft prior to the lithium-ions showing up in aircraft. We found that lead-acid batteries changed chemistries significantly when they were deep discharged. This is evident when people have cars that sit for a while. The batteries have normal self-discharge and need to be charged when the car owner finally gets around to wanting to start the engine. That really wears a battery down, and they make trickle chargers to prevent batteries from deep discharging.
Then came the lithium-ions. These tests by the way also involved testing of charging curves or how the voltage on the batteries are changed as they charged. We found two things. One is lithium-ions behave similarly to lead-acid batteries when deep discharge cycles occur. Both types of batteries lose some capacity. There are different lithium-ion chemistries, but they all seem to have the same characteristics with deep discharge cycles. The other thing we found is that most devices have smart chargers in order to prevent lithium-ion fires. They will take a large voltage and convert it to a charging cycle voltage that varies depending on where the charge percentage is. While these chargers are sold to make them look like they're tweaking the hell out of the batteries' capacity, they're mostly there to achieve 100% charge and prevent fires. These chargers not only monitor the batteries' internal voltage but also their temperature.
With our smartphones, this all boils down to chargers simply providing enough power to allow the internal smart charger to charge the battery efficiently, safely and quickly. I've found the Tylt Vu will charge a Nexus 6 and Note 8 sufficiently enough to where it can be used and gain charge simultaneously. As far as deep discharge cycles are concerned, I have actual lab test knowledge of battery charging and discharging, and I've applied this knowledge to my phones and many other devices. In all cases, I have always been able to preserve my batteries such that when I sell them, the new owner gets what I consider a very good OEM installed battery. One of the perils of buying used electronics is the condition of the battery, and I explain this to my buyers. I've always had happy buyers that never complained after the sale.

Huele Fello said:
From my point of view it's wrong. There could be some circumstances where the 35% is correct, but in general it is best to not discharge batteries down to those levels too many times, because the discharge cycle changes the chemistry inside the battery such that it doesn't accept the full amount of charge that it accepted prior to the deep discharge. The chemistry changes significantly when you deep discharge down to the single digit percentages and less as as you go up to 50%. My batteries have discharged deeply in the past but they were few and far between. I speculate that when I sold my Nexus 6 about 1.5 months ago, its battery capacity was about 98% due to my careful diligence.
Now why should you take my word on this? I can ask you the same question about the 35%. Why should you take his word on it? My opinion comes from decades of electrical engineering work, mostly in programmable devices and ASIC development, but some of it is in testing. I was hired as a consultant to test batteries for aircraft prior to the lithium-ions showing up in aircraft.
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OK, you sold me on it. I had been trained as an electronics technician in a program that was closely associated with NASA/Langley, so I know how smart electronics engineers for avionics testing can be.

Huele Fello said:
From my point of view it's wrong. There could be some circumstances where the 35% is correct, but in general it is best to not discharge batteries down to those levels too many times, because the discharge cycle changes the chemistry inside the battery such that it s had happy buyers that never complained after the sale.
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This is a very informative post.
Any comments about charging the phone to 100% and leaving the phone connected to charger most of the time

Techvir said:
This is a very informative post.
Any comments about charging the phone to 100% and leaving the phone connected to charger most of the time
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I used to leave my Nexus 6 on my Tylt Vu wireless charger all of the time. In fact, it was a good parking spot, because it's tilted 45 degrees and easy to see while I punched away on my computers. Then I replaced it with the Note 8, and it's the same scenario. The phones charge to 100% and then trickle charge to keep the battery topped off. This works quite well for practically all phones, regardless of whether they are USB or wireless charged, because smart chargers inside the phones prevent them from overcharging. They do this by monitoring both battery voltage and temperature.
Now let's take the case of the Note 7, more commonly known in some professional circles as the Flame Boss. There was something obviously wrong with it. Can you guess what it was? It was the smart charger, which is the gateway to power in and power out. It was designed wrong for several reasons, but the main reason was the battery and charger weren't matched correctly to the load, i.e. the Note 7 electronics. This caused the charger to allow the battery to deliver power to the electronics regardless of temp. If it had been designed correctly, the battery would have been bigger, which means it could have delivered more power while dissipating more heat to the environment and thus keeping its temperature within limits. The batteries may also have had design and/or manufacturing defects that possibly exacerbated the problem but weren't found in testing. Frankly, I'm surprised that Samsung didn't wring out this problem, because they have an excellent hardware track record. My experience tells me that there's probably several Samsung engineers that said "I told you so" after the fiasco.
So to answer your question directly, yes, go ahead and charge it 100% of the time. You won't hurt the battery, and you will prolong its life, because the chemistry inside that produces ions and thus electrons stays more consistent, ready to start those discharge and charge cycles from near 100% capacity.

My only beef with the Tylt Vu is that it uses a proprietary connector, whereas the vast majority of other wireless charging stands (I personally like the itian A6, and have a number of them scattered around the house and office) use standard connectors such as MicroUSB.

What do you guys think about the official Samsung charger? It seems to be good because it has a fan, since the one he recommended has a proprietary connector, although I already ordered one, I'm reluctant to get more if they're limited in that way.

Just got the Vu, I love it, it's nice...

Any Qi compatible wireless charger should work perfectly fine with your device.