MotoX vs Galaxy S3 battery life - Moto X Q&A

Hey guys, I currently own a GS3 and I am interested in upgrading to a newer phone. I am certain the MotoX is an upgrade in nearly all phases, however the one thing I am concerned about is battery life.
Can anyone who has had both the MotoX and the GS3 comment on battery life? I can currently run from about 7am to 11pm (16hrs) on one battery with moderate use.
Since the Nexus5 is a no-go on VZW I need to find something new and the S4 isn't exactly impressing me. I haven't upgraded since the Galaxy Nexus and I only have a S3 because of warranty replacement.

Moto X has great battery life.
Sent from my XT1058 using Tapatalk

I run my phone from 6:30 am until 11 or 12. I really have to try hard to get this battery down past 25% left. Normal user, text, phone calls, browsing, a little gaming. I get an average of over 5 hours of screen time on.
sent from my XT1058 Moto X

On my sgs3 I could barely crack 3 hours screen time with 12 hours off charge. I never made it through a full day with the sgs3, unless I didn't use it. I get twice the longevity with the moto x... I routinely get 4 hours screen time with 20 hours off charge.. Yesterday I got 22 hours off charge with 5 hours 45 minutes screen time... Stock 4.4 no root
AT&T Moto X rocking 4.4

Awesome, thanks for the replys guys! The one spec comparison I saw gave the GS3 a HUGE advantage in battery life, however it is great to hear that is wrong.
Any other pros/cons of the MotoX vs GS3 I should be aware of?

switched from an S3 to the Moto X.
couldn't get thru the day with the s3, moto x gets me with 50ish by the time i get home.

Yep, same boat. Battery is constantly awesome. Gone are the days where I charge my phone while awake. A nightly charge gets it done... And if I forget to charge at night, came generally make it thru half the next day without worrying about it.
I use my phone to read, too, and 5 hrs of screen on time is pretty normal. (Moto x)
Sent from my XT1060 using Tapatalk

Related

Battery Impression

Can your MOTO X work for you as long as they promised? If the phone actually lasts 24 hours, when you do charge it? Over night or morning at office? Share your thoughts please
freeintruth said:
Can your MOTO X work for you as long as they promised? If the phone actually lasts 24 hours, when you do charge it? Over night or morning at office? Share your thoughts please
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I sincerely think that we should wait for the official release of this phone. Some of XDA memmber should be able to get their hands on by the end of this month
Yes
Motorola is known for making amazing batteries
My second day with the phone ... Use a lot ... Same battery at the end of the day like my old razr hd
Sent from my XT1058 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
I can easily make a full 24hrs + with moderate useage. Have had the phone since Saturday.
Sent from my GT-I9505G using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
So is the general consensus on battery life that it's good enough to get through a day with moderate type usage? One of the pros of active notifications is that it decreases your battery usage because you're not constantly waking up the phone to check notifications and time, right? I was kinda meh on the whole customization thing til I just went through Moto Maker and I kinda fell in love with what I designed. I know I like the size and on-screen buttons a whole lot more than the Maxx. It's just a question of whether I can sacrifice the larger battery and I know I don't need the two full days, but I don't wanna be stuck on a charger before one day is out either.
Any review online is saying it's above average battery life.
After a full charge, screen time over 3 hours with 55% battery left. I'm impressed.
Sent from my XT1058 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
This is with moderate usage. I'll let you guys be the judge.
Sent from my XT1058 using Tapatalk 4
I got a pretty much linear drop in battery regardless of usage yesterday. I put it on the charger after about 18 hours, but it would've made it to at least 24 had I left it off the charger. The interesting thing is that I had it hooked up to my car stereo to listen to music for a 2.5 hour drive, mostly with the screen off, and there wasn't any noticable difference in battery life. Also, I could hear stuff in the music i've never heard before, i.e. the sound is amazing.
Battery seems real good
martinezma99 said:
After a full charge, screen time over 3 hours with 55% battery left. I'm impressed.
Sent from my XT1058 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How are you guys getting this? I was at 20% with 3 hrs on screen time.
Sent from my XT1058 using Tapatalk 2
Battery life is amazing.
Sent from my XT1058 using Tapatalk 4
After almost a week of using it, I actually find the battery life is a bit annoying in a good way though. I am not a heavy user. During the day, a dozen of times of youtube+netflix during breaks, a few phone calls and sms, while outside always have gps on. At the end of the day, I have about half battery left. To charge it over the night is somewhat electricity waste. But not charging it is to leave my next day somewhat anxious. So yeah, maybe I am too greedy in hoping for two days no charging. My Nexus 4 really requires at least one charge a day and this habit has grown on me. Oh well...let's hope after JB 4.3 update, X's battery life can be prolonged a little more
For the people that have posted stats. Is your battery saver on or off?
My best battery cycle was 31 hours standby and close to four hours screen time. It died before I could take screenshots though, will try again on this battery cycle.
Sent from my XT1058 using Tapatalk 2
The battery life has been great as long as I don't use it as a phone lol. Some reason phone calls dragon my battery super fast even more so than screen on time
Sent from my XT1058 using xda app-developers app
I am at one day and five hours with 31% battery left, screen time of 22% with battery saver off, most of the time I have been at home with WiFi on.
Sent from my Moto X
I'm on my second day and the battery isn't that great so far. Right now I'm at 77% after 6 hours and only 30 minutes of screen time. Also Android OS is the highest battery user at 35%.
Awesome battery... Verizon's, fully charged this morning and now I'm at 13 hours later, 4h 15m screentime and still 33% left.
This is with battery saver off, brightness auto
Also used blutooth audio for 30 minutes and GPS for about 20 minutes.
Loving the battery life and not sure how I survived without active notifications.

Could the highly varied battery life be a manufacturing issue?

Just throwing this out there... I have a Nexus 5 here has pretty poor battery, mostly when it comes to the screen time. Barely getting 2 hours per charge. In fact, I called google today and they are going to replace it; more on that in a bit.
I've tried stock, CM11, CM11 w/chaos kernel, paranoid w/franco kernel - neither is better than the other.. fter seeing some people on stock + franco and other combinations getting 6-7 hours of screen time it got me thinking. Could we be seeing a set of battery manufacturing defects? Google has already changed the speaker grill and button designs [ironically, my Nexus 5 that was ordered 1 week ago came w/the smaller speaker grill and loose buttons].
However, I'm wondering if there was a bad batch of batteries out there? If I didn't get an exchange from google I was going to pop this phone open and replace the battery with a new one just to prove a point. When I spoke to google today, they thought that a 20% drop in about 30 minutes of use was excessive, which I have to agree.
Ideas? Thoughts?
-t
I'm repeating a post from the battery thread I just made....
[quote name="wdwms" post=51191930]I'm wondering if all the variances in battery life we are seeing could be a sign of a broader issue - a large batch of defective batteries?
opened this thread for thoughts/comments: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2686119[/QUOTE]
Nope. Its the variances in usage and settings. Guaranteed.
I got 6 hours screen time plus on my Moto x....always. with no changes whatsoever, my wife gets 4 1/2. Why? 90 percent of my use was tapatalk. Mostly just text. 90 percent of her use is Facebook, mostly images....with text. Images take more power to load than text.
That primary difference in our usage patterns made a consistent hour and half screen time difference. Oh....and she makes a few calls, I barely ever had or made calls.
Sent from my cell phone telephone....
Not meaning to debunk your theory....there are occasional defects....but mostly the huge differences are usage and settings.
The guys getting 6 hours plus screen time usually are running with most services off or frozen. Dim screens. Obviously not gaming much or at all. Not using location services or navigating. These things can make giant differences in battery life.
I suggest getting gsam. And doing a full discharge with it and doing some screen shots at the end. I'm betting if you think you have an issue that can be solved.....or its your particular usage patterns.
Sent from my cell phone telephone....
I can stand to have location services off for the hour of better SOT. However I can't stand having a dim screen so auto is the way I go! I still get 41/2 to 5 hours SOT!
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
JNMM said:
I can stand to have location services off for the hour of better SOT. However I can't stand having a dim screen so auto is the way I go! I still get 41/2 to 5 hours SOT!
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
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Click to collapse
I was using auto....and yeah, generally it's not to bad....now. I think 4.4.2 improved it....doesn't Jack up to full as much.
Then I saw someone mention "display brightness" app ....its awesome. A little slider always on my screen. Love it!
Sent from my N5, N7, Moto X, G Tab 3 or S2.....
I get 6 hours screen on time on the reggie. Location left on (high accuracy) and same with Google now. I think the only things I have turned off in Google now are search history and location reporting. NFC off. Auto brightness. I agree with kj its based on your usage. I really only use my phone for tapatalk or texting mainly. Some Facebook (not really too into it) emails and a liiiitle bit of gaming.. I also use custom kernels and slightly undervolt. My phone can take -25 across the board and 675mV at 300mhz. I mostly UV for heating purposes when I game. (Addicted to robot unicorn attack 2 and smash it). Also don't use any kind of tap or swipe to wake (KILLS battery on this phone). Plus I always charge with USB. I read somewhere that lithium ion batteries discharge slower if they are charged with USB as opposed to AC. That and I don't have free A/C slots in my man cave. Just a USB port to from my PlayStation to a qi wireless charger. Yes it takes a while....
your battery life majorly depends on tbe quality of your phone/data connection. really majorly! it can make the difference of just 2-3 sot hours if not such a great signal is around, to 5-6 hours sot if there is a great phone/data signal. and it varies greatly for everyone. also, how you personally use your phone makes a large impact. its also going to vary greatly as we al use our phones differently. and how you set up your phone and which apps you use is going to majorly affect battery. and thats going to vary greatly as well. and there are even more reasons for the large variation in battery life.
Unless you heavily use GPS or voice calls, 2 hours SoT is too low. To get that you probably have a rogue processes preventing the phone from sleeping. In comparison, I've used the phone to game for over 3 hours on a charge.
Once that's out of the way and if you're still not happy with the battery life you're seeing ask yourself: what's running on my phone that I don't really need?
Every frivolous widget, forgotten service, or Google Now card is going to use some amount of battery and they add up on a limited power source.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
simms22 said:
your battery life majorly depends on tbe quality of your phone/data connection. really majorly! it can make the difference of just 2-3 sot hours if not such a great signal is around, to 5-6 hours sot if there is a great phone/data signal. and it varies greatly for everyone. also, how you personally use your phone makes a large impact. its also going to vary greatly as we al use our phones differently. and how you set up your phone and which apps you use is going to majorly affect battery. and thats going to vary greatly as well. and there are even more reasons for the large variation in battery life.
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Click to collapse
That's a great point @simms22, don't think people factor into the equation quality of reception. In China on crappy HSPA+ with 1 bar, I'm lucky to get 3-4 SOT. In Los Angeles on an excellent LTE connection I can get 5-6 SOT. So reception adds 2 hrs of SOT in my case.
OP, as I suggested. Get gsam from play store....do a full 100 to very low discharge and lets see what it shows.
Otherwise we're all just guessing.
Sent from my N5, N7, Moto X, G Tab 3 or S2.....
kj2112 said:
OP, as I suggested. Get gsam from play store....do a full 100 to very low discharge and lets see what it shows.
Otherwise we're all just guessing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Started that last night, installed GSAM this am... 18h on battery so far, 48 minutes of screen time; i'm at 78%; Wifi has been on the whole time.. Stock build, rooted/bootloader unlocked; 2 gmail accounts, 1 exchange account (30 minute syncs).
wdwms said:
Started that last night, installed GSAM this am... 18h on battery so far, 48 minutes of screen time; i'm at 78%; Wifi has been on the whole time.. Stock build, rooted/bootloader unlocked; 2 gmail accounts, 1 exchange account (30 minute syncs).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Do a few screenshots when your battery is fairly low. Don't reboot or gsam resets.
For screens, try main gsam screen, app screen...then click the app screen dropdown, and do time held awake and kernel wakelocks. If you're not rooted, not sure which of these won't work.
Sent from my N5, N7, Moto X, G Tab 3 or S2.....
kj2112 said:
Do a few screenshots when your battery is fairly low. Don't reboot or gsam resets.
For screens, try main gsam screen, app screen...then click the app screen dropdown, and do time held awake and kernel wakelocks. If you're not rooted, not sure which of these won't work.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My son played some games on the phone and i had to use the phone for work, so i need to restart the test.
Right now i'm at 1d 17h 40m, screentime 3h 28m; GPS off, google now off, hotword off, bluetooth off, wifi on, LTE.
Regardless, in gsam, the time held awake is
System 33s
Battery Monitor Widge Pro 29s
Google Play 18s
Android System 15s
Kernal Wakelogs
"no apps that have consumed the specified...."
I'm going to let the battery run out (at 6% right now); I've disabled wakelock for google play store in App ops; charge it up and then let it run w/out Wifi, and leave it on 3G.. My location is on the edge of LTE so its best to leave it on 3G here
Will post screenshots of that test when completed in the next 24-48hrs
Thoughts?
wdwms said:
My son played some games on the phone and i had to use the phone for work, so i need to restart the test.
Right now i'm at 1d 17h 40m, screentime 3h 28m; GPS off, google now off, hotword off, bluetooth off, wifi on, LTE.
Regardless, in gsam, the time held awake is
System 33s
Battery Monitor Widge Pro 29s
Google Play 18s
Android System 15s
Kernal Wakelogs
"no apps that have consumed the specified...."
I'm going to let the battery run out (at 6% right now); I've disabled wakelock for google play store in App ops; charge it up and then let it run w/out Wifi, and leave it on 3G.. My location is on the edge of LTE so its best to leave it on 3G here
Will post screenshots of that test when completed in the next 24-48hrs
Thoughts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
We can look at the screen shots still....but 1day 17hours with 3 and a half hours screen time? That sound pretty darn good to me! LOL
Guys getting 5 hours of screen time and that are usually near 24 hours, it much less. At a day and 17 hours....and that screen time, I'm doubting you have an issue at all.
Sent from my N5, N7, Moto X, G Tab 3 or S2.....
kj2112 said:
We can look at the screen shots still....but 1day 17hours with 3 and a half hours screen time? That sound pretty darn good to me! LOL
Guys getting 5 hours of screen time and that are usually near 24 hours, it much less. At a day and 17 hours....and that screen time, I'm doubting you have an issue at all.
Sent from my N5, N7, Moto X, G Tab 3 or S2.....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Please refer this. Hopefully battery issues will be fixed.
kj2112 said:
We can look at the screen shots still....but 1day 17hours with 3 and a half hours screen time? That sound pretty darn good to me! LOL
Guys getting 5 hours of screen time and that are usually near 24 hours, it much less. At a day and 17 hours....and that screen time, I'm doubting you have an issue at all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Let me run a long discharge over the next day or so, and see where I stand.. i'm going to leave WiFi off, and 3G on (no LTE)
rajneeshk said:
Please refer this. Hopefully battery issues will be fixed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I just said in another post about this.....I hope the "fix" doesn't end up messing up my current amazing battery life. LOL.
Sent from my N5, N7, Moto X, G Tab 3 or S2.....
wdwms said:
Let me run a long discharge over the next day or so, and see where I stand.. i'm going to leave WiFi off, and 3G on (no LTE)
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Click to collapse
Keep in mind 3g uses the most battery for your internet condition. WiFi and LTE are more efficient though your low signal on LTE wouldn't help.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
bblzd said:
Keep in mind 3g uses the most battery for your internet condition. WiFi and LTE are more efficient though your low signal on LTE wouldn't help.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
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Click to collapse
That is false. 3g uses less than LTE. Why do you think the Moto G gets such great battery life? LTE is a battery hog. WiFi uses the least power of the 3. Unless your 3g signal is very weak, it will conserve battery life over LTE.
Sent from my Red Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
housry23 said:
That is false. 3g uses less than LTE. Why do you think the Moto G gets such great battery life? LTE is a battery hog. WiFi uses the least power of the 3. Unless your 3g signal is very weak, it will conserve battery life over LTE.
Sent from my Red Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It has been confirmed by users on XDA as well as this test.
http://anandtech.com/show/7517/google-nexus-5-review/3
N5 LTE is more efficient than previous LTE phones due to some Qualcomm tech. Also by being considerably faster than 3G it can finish its task and go idle quicker.
Moto G battery life is mainly due to its considerably less powerful specifications.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
bblzd said:
It has been confirmed by users on XDA as well as this test.
http://anandtech.com/show/7517/google-nexus-5-review/3
N5 LTE is more efficient than previous LTE phones due to some Qualcomm tech. Also by being considerably faster than 3G it can finish its task and go idle quicker.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I stand corrected. I will do my own test using only 3g tomorrow night. Thanks for the info.
Sent from my Red Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

Any thoughts to help me out?

So I've used Moto Maker at least 10 times now and go to checkout(Pure Edition) but I haven't been able to pull the trigger. Currently use OnePlus as my daily driver but I also have a G3.
Neither of those devices are really what's holding me back.. It's the N6 that's supposedly going to be released this Wednesday for TMO. I used a Note 3 for almost a year and I think that was pretty much the size limit I could handle. Mostly cuz the phone is always in my front jeans pocket and at times the Note was a little uncomfortable.
I think what's holding me back is the X's smaller battery. On my OPO I average daily between 3-4sot with about 17 hours off charger and still have plenty to spare when I plug it in.
Anyone have any thoughts that might help? I realize the X 2013 was arguably the best phone off the year.. Do you think this years X can also achieve that status? Thanks!
Battery life on the X is a non-issue. I average 6 hours SOT without even trying, and if I let it go, I usually have at least 20% left at bedtime. If I do a lot of gaming I'll get 4hrs SOT. My buddy has an X too and he gets comparable battery life.
And yeah, I definitely think that all things considered, the X is easily the best phone to come out this year. It's nothing short of amazing.
_MetalHead_ said:
Battery life on the X is a non-issue. I average 6 hours SOT without even trying, and if I let it go, I usually have at least 20% left at bedtime. If I do a lot of gaming I'll get 4hrs SOT. My buddy has an X too and he gets comparable battery life.
And yeah, I definitely think that all things considered, the X is easily the best phone to come out this year. It's nothing short of amazing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks for the input.. I never game on my phones other than maybe a few minutes playing clash of clans..I mostly browse g+, Facebook and watch YouTube vids so nothing really to draining on the battery

Moto X 2013 Battery Problems

I am using a Moto X 2013 Dev Edition on T-Mobile, this particular unit I got from Moto Care after my initial one broke. It feels like it gets much worse battery life than the first. I did not unlock or root this one yet. I'm on the latest update with pretty good LTE/4G coverage and the phone completely discharges from full to 5% in less than 4.5 hours while only browsing! It then recharges from 5% to 87% in less than 1.5 hours, this seems unusually fast and led me to believe that the battery is faulty. What do you think?
Check what is using battery the most. You can check it in battery settings. Moreover I would encourage you to install one of the apps like Better Battery Stats (you need root) or Gsam Battery Monitor to see which app prevents your phone from going to sleep.
Sent from my XT1052
Um... Your screen was on that whole time mostly.
That's your issue. ?
Yes I know it was, I was browsing for 4.5 hours XD
But I feel that's a short time for the phone to completely discharge.
I felt like my first Moto X retail unit did much better, maybe this one is refurbished and the battery is worn already?
Thoughts?
PsychoKilla666 said:
Yes I know it was, I was browsing for 4.5 hours XD
But I feel that's a short time for the phone to completely discharge.
I felt like my first Moto X retail unit did much better, maybe this one is refurbished and the battery is worn already?
Thoughts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried to fully discharge and recharge it while turned off?
I did this and now my Battery is nice again! About 24 hours with about 3 hours SOT! Wifi + Location always on, 1 hour of recording (so not Deep sleep), 4G and a little Spotify streaming via Network!
ahhh and i deinstalled Switch Widget Pro and some other Apps because they kept my X from sleeping! :good:
Good luck!
I say 4,5 hours of screen on time while surfing is great for the x, i don't see the problem here

battery life

I dont know if its just me. I also understand that battery life will be reduced when moving to new OS' however, im having to charge my g2 up twice a day and im hardly using it heavily. Play alittle clash of clans surf the internet and thats it. Actually right now seems to be a record woke up at 6 and i just got the 15% alert...whiskey tango foxtrot. Is lollipop genuinely that bad on battery life? Or is my phone reaching the old age point?
Lollipop is definitely worse than kitkat but it sounds like you need a factory reset.
my mom complain of bad battery life after upgrading to lollipop
My wife's phone will discharge sitting there in non-use in 6 hours. 4 hours or less if actually being used some. totally unacceptable. I did a FDR and still don't see imrpovement.
I'm not a big LG fan, so I haven't kept up with how to flash/root these things, if it was real easy I'd flash it back to kitkat. My wife loved the phone prior to the update but this is making this phone nearly unusable, and not suitable for its purpose (if it has to be plugged in all the time, is it really a cell phone?).
I was losing 5-6% per hour with Lollipop with my phone just sitting as well. I rolled it back to kitkat and have used 1% per hour today. I havent used the phone much today and have 90% left after 10 hours of use. I'm much happier with kitkat. I also have the LG 8.3 tablet and am not going to take lollipop update.
Sent from my VK810 4G using Tapatalk

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