GSMArena labs: introducing a faster way to compare the battery endurance of phones
- ?
- Anonymous
- ucy
- 16 Apr 2021
Peter-B, 16 Apr 2021If you go to the Battery life page (all those battery endur... moreI've known that for a long time. My problem with the battery test is that nobody plays videos offline on loop from the gallery, we all use YouTube and Netflix. So it's a little useless to use the slider, because my battery will obviously end up being more.
- W
- Woohoo
- 7kk
- 16 Apr 2021
beep bop boop, 16 Apr 2021yes but FHD/120hz is a safer route than QHD/120hzLTPO more than compensates for the high res & hrr combo (in some phones), just look at the S21 series improvement in endurance. Don't know why 1+, Oppo & others using ltpo can't score worse or on par with their predecessors.
- J
- Jarvis
- 3pR
- 16 Apr 2021
Peter-B, 16 Apr 2021If you go to the Battery life page (all those battery endur... moreYes, indeed, and that is great! But as you say in the article, the full table is quite long and navigating it can be cumbersome, as one is usually not interested in all the phones in the database but would like to see a few comparable ones side-by-side (figuratively). This new widget does an excellent job at fulfilling this (Thanks, GSMA!) but it forces you to abandon this "personalised" endurance rating which is the one that is most useful - since the choice of a phone is always a personal matter. The given Endurance rating that is provided is useful for a sort of general bird-eye view from the side of the reviewer (who of course has to be general since they can't accommodate the habits and preferences of different people). But from the side of the person looking to choose a phone (that is, your reader!) what actually matters is that "personalised" custom endurance rating, which thankfully can be easily calculated because GSMA already has the battery endurance data and the person already knows their habits - they just need to be able to input it so that the two get combined and the magic can happen!
I'm taking the time to say all this because I think it's entirely possible to implement a customization option to the widget similar to the one you mention that exists for the full table. I'm not saying it is trivial work, but it seems to me it wouldn't be too challenging to implement - it's essentially three adjustment bars - and it would greatly increase the usefulness of the widget for the reader! (It could of course be presented in other ways such as three drop-down menus, but I think that the adjustable bars are the most intuitive option and you did well to have those with the f1ull battery endurance table.)
Side note: maybe also consider increasing the range available for those adjustable bars (the ones that exist in the full endurance table, as well as the ones I'm proposing and hoping you implement for the widget :) ). They currently only allow a range up to 4 hours for each, which might be a bit too restrictive for some people's usage. I'm not saying it's particularly healthy for someone to do Web browsing for 6 hours or calling for 5 hours or video-watching for 8 hours, or (god forbid!) all of the above, but I don't see any good reason one should not be able to customise the endurance rating according to that if that's their usage.
Side note 2: I agree with another poster that it would be very helpful to include in the database the endurance ratings for the different refresh rate options of a phone. While the differences in endurance with different refresh rates might be almost negligible for some phones, for others it's quite significant. The difference is further exacerbated by different use cases: if one only makes calls there is basically no difference, if one does lots of Web browsing the differences can be quite large. Another reason to allow customisability according to usage in the comparison widget! ;)
Not-so-side note: I agree with the above poster that maybe it would be a good idea to have a more realistic default setting than 1h-1h-1h, one that reflects approximately how people on average use their phones. I assume that would mean at the very least an increase in the Web browsing default time. But then again I might be wrong about what the average usage is. And yes, I do understand that GSMA would probably like to keep backward "compatibility"/comparability of endurance scores, and that while it might be easy to adjust the scores themselves with a new default (say, 1h-2h-1h) in the individual phone endurance widgets that have long been in reviews, it would probably be a pain (and somewhat "revisionist") to change the text of the review that references the score number. That said, it wouldn't matter so much what the default is if there was (hopefully, there will be!) an easy way for the reader to adjust it to their preferred values in the comparison widget as proposed above.
Thanks for reading my unexpectedly long TED talk!
- ?
- Anonymous
- pv$
- 16 Apr 2021
Nice
- Peter-B
- xJM
- 16 Apr 2021
Anonymous, 16 Apr 2021Dear GSMArena,
I think most people now use phone more th... moreIf you go to the Battery life page (all those battery endurance images in the reviews link to it and it's linked in the specs page), you will see three sliders to adjust the daily call/web/video times. This will calculate an Endurance rating customized to your usage and sort phones by it:
https://www.gsmarena.com/battery-test.php3
- A
- Azarea
- Kid
- 16 Apr 2021
This is totally respect of GSMarena job but I am still wondering about the data related on temperature factor. As example, it happens to be in the tropical has higher temperature than subtropical.
- X
- XiaomiFan
- 8vZ
- 16 Apr 2021
Shadocx, 16 Apr 2021Indeed, I can't see the difference between QHD+ and FH... moreTrue, so true. Upvote
- S
- Shadocx
- 33D
- 16 Apr 2021
beep bop boop, 16 Apr 2021yes but FHD/120hz is a safer route than QHD/120hzIndeed, I can't see the difference between QHD+ and FHD+, unless my face is up the screen, so 4k on phones is totally useless IMO.
120Hz refresh rate is more important.
- YUKI93
- KZK
- 16 Apr 2021
Good idea, but I do hope that team can include the result with 60Hz refresh rate for smartphones that has high refresh rate. I don't use 120Hz all the time, so that would be helpful.
- p
- pan dv
- sxr
- 16 Apr 2021
one of the useful test i find...
as i am enlightened that same battery capacity of different handsets translate to longer battery life...
you might also want to update your testing...
and since there are different factors affecting battery endurance, you might want to make separate tests, perhaps depending on use cases...
like some people game for long hours, some just browse the web... etc...
or perhaps just considering hrr...
a test for max pixel density, 60hz...
a test for low pixel density (if allowed), at max hz...
both max and both minimum (if possible)...
just to give different people an idea depending on their use cases...
as for me being a "casual user" the current testing is fine... i just choose a phone that has higher battery endurance, even with 3000-4000mah only...
- b
- beep bop boop
- GYi
- 16 Apr 2021
Shadocx, 16 Apr 2021It's not about not getting over it, a 1440p resolution... moreyes but FHD/120hz is a safer route than QHD/120hz
- ?
- Anonymous
- K5R
- 16 Apr 2021
Dear GSMArena,
I think most people now use phone more than 3 hours/day. I think the real life usage of the phone doesn't line up with you're endurance. In other words, you're "endurance" words doesn't have a meaning. because 100hour endurance doesn't translate to real 3 days usage.
I think your endurance number need to change the test to 1hour talk + 2 hour web + 2 hour video. Let just say ENDURANCE 2.0 is 5 hour usage.
- b
- battetyguru
- x3V
- 16 Apr 2021
Thank you GSMArena for releasing this feature.
- D
- AnonD-731363
- Lfw
- 16 Apr 2021
Clap clap clap.
Appreciate your work guys and love youuuuuuuu.
- S
- Shadocx
- 33D
- 16 Apr 2021
beep bop boop, 16 Apr 2021you guys will never get over it not having HRR do you? Plus... moreIt's not about not getting over it, a 1440p resolution with 120 Hz refresh rate will obviously consume more battery.
But for a battery that isn't even 4k mAh, the 12 Pro Max did quite well, not in call tho since it doesn't rely on display.
Then the SD 888 equipped phones seems to all have mediocre stand by endurance.
- S
- Sskre
- KSE
- 16 Apr 2021
Thank you, Very useful.
- b
- beep bop boop
- GYi
- 16 Apr 2021
Shadocx, 16 Apr 2021How so? The call time is the lowest in this comparison, and... moreyou guys will never get over it not having HRR do you? Plus its not like non tech savvy person would care
(btw i would pick FHD/120hz since their batteries are not that big)
- Android-Authority
- MxL
- 16 Apr 2021
You guys need to add gaming performance in terms of hours in addition to the video playback, web browsing and talk time scores.
Some phones like Find X3 pro give much more gaming time compared to S21 series despite scoring lower overall endurance rating.