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Samsung Galaxy S4 Battery Life

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killrqueen

Newbie
I just got my galaxy s4. I first had lolipop as a firmware which drained my battery 4% per minute. Now i have downgraded the firmware to kitkat. The battery improved...but still not as good as my s3. It now drops 1% per minute. Even when off the battery is gone fast. Is this normal for the s4? Or is there something wrong with it?
 
killrqueen said:
I just got my galaxy s4. I first had lolipop as a firmware which drained my battery 4% per minute. Now i have downgraded the firmware to kitkat. The battery improved...but still not as good as my s3. It now drops 1% per minute. Even when off the battery is gone fast. Is this normal for the s4? Or is there something wrong with it?
Click to expand...
I too have Kitkat on my S4 and have had similar issues in the past. Now it will go all day with normal usage for me and be at about 60% when I put it on the charger at night. The way I solved my problem was to look at what was discharging the battery and uninstall the app. Here's what I did. Wait until your phone has significantly discharged. Then go to Settings, select "More" on the top line menu, then select "Battery". This should show you by percentages what apps have used up your battery.
 
Alright, from 100 to 12 it seems screen,android system and android os are the top 3 that's draining it. What should I do? I didn't even use it much but even off it seems the screen is draining the most. Any ideas?
 
Since you went through the process of downgrading your S4 back to KitKat, try wiping the system cache partition. The system cache is different from the regular app caches and resides in its own separate partition than you where your files are stored so this won't affect your data. Power off your phone, then while holding down the Volume Up, the Home, and the Power buttons start it back up again. Once your S4 vibrates you can release the Power button but continue holding down the Volume Up and Home buttons. This will start your phone up into its Recovery Mode. Use the buttons indicated to navigate the text-only menus and select 'wipe cache partition'. This will only take a few seconds. Now select the option to reboot your phone.

As for Android System and OS being in the top three that's pretty normal. Also note the Display is always a big battery draw, when you wake your screen from its sleep mode there's power going to the back light, the graphics processor (GPU) is working, and whatever you're doing to interact with your phone is working the main processor itself (CPU). You might want to change the Brightness level of your screen in the Display menu in your Settings. The dimmer you set your screen the less energy it uses.
 
Alright i cleared the cache, I think it might have helped a tiny bit. Battery drain is still pretty fast however i came across an app called BetterBatteryStats. Im still doing research on it but should i use it? Think it might help finding the problem
 
killrqueen said:
Alright i cleared the cache, I think it might have helped a tiny bit. Battery drain is still pretty fast however i came across an app called BetterBatteryStats. Im still doing research on it but should i use it? Think it might help finding the problem
Click to expand...
I have no experience with it but doing a quick search on BBS it does appear to get some good reviews, including on XDA Developers.

One thing to keep in mind is no matter what you do to optimize your battery usage, if your S4 is still running its original battery at this point it's over three years old, so no matter what you do it could only have a minimal effect. Generally after a couple of years any smartphone battery will start to decline its effective capacity. Depending on how it was used and charged throughout its life, the level of 'wear and tear' could be a lot or not much.

S4 batteries are user replaceable so you might want to think about picking up a replacement. Usually an OEM battery is the best, safest option but this slightly higher capacity (2800 mAh vs 2600 mAh), third-party battery gets good reviews, has the same dimensions as an OEM battery (no special cover necessary), and it includes NFC (Samsung puts the NFC chip in battery on some phones instead of in the phone itself). Anyway, this RAVPower battery is just a tentative suggestion:
https://www.amazon.com/RAVPower-280...=1476379734&sr=1-5&keywords=galaxy+s4+battery
 
I just got the s4 last Friday, but il still consider getting another battery. Im still going to see if I can find the problem and just compare the 2 batteries if I get the other one . Thanks for the link!
 
If you bought it new that would indicate it's been sitting around untouched for three years or so. The shelf life for a smartphone battery isn't that long, they need to be recharged at least a little every several months. I'd just pick up a new battery, it might not be worth the aggravation.
But if it was pre-owned, than the battery life will be based a lot on its previous owner and what kind of usage the phone went through.
 
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I see, thanks for clarifying. What you said makes sense. I ordered the battery so hopefully when it comes it will have better battery life!
 
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