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New Garmin Enduro 3 User from Apple - Battery Draining ~10% Daily? Normal or Issue?

4655953
6 months ago

I recently switched to the Garmin Enduro 3 after using an Apple Watch for years, and I'm still getting used to the Garmin ecosystem and its settings. Loving the functionality, but I have a question about the battery life.

I've had the Enduro 3 for a little over a week, and I'm noticing it’s been losing around 10% of battery each day. Most days, I’m tracking 1-2 hours of activity (mostly runs, walks, or cycling), and it’s paired with my phone when I’m home. I also wear it all day and use it for sleep tracking every night. I did have one 8+ hour hike on my third day, which might have contributed to this drain, but I thought the battery would still last closer to the 30-day range that was advertised.

I have all settings on default and haven’t made any major tweaks, so maybe I'm unknowingly keeping some power-draining features on. My watch will be down to around 20% tomorrow, so it looks like I'll be recharging soon, which is fine if that’s normal. Coming from an Apple Watch, the Garmin battery life is already a huge improvement, but I want to make sure this is expected performance and not a sign of a potential issue with my device.

Would love any feedback or advice from the community—especially if there are ways to optimize battery life or if this usage seems typical. Thanks in advance for the help!

  • 0 6 months ago

    First of all I'd connect the watch to a computer with Garmin Express and check for updates with it. If it does not help, there are some other tips also in the thread forums.garmin.com/.../1853867

  • 0 6 months ago

    Sounds normal with all your activities. The advertised 30-40 days is only in the watch mode, gps tracking eats a lot of power. Also keep wifi off and pulse ox in "on demand" mode.

  • 0 6 months ago in reply to MattBigmonster

    No, that's not normal. It is supposed to go for at least 60 hours of GPS activity on the full battery - that is in the most accurate multi-band mode. With the auto-select mode it should consume even less. Therefore 1-2 hours of GPS activity should consume only 1.5-3% of battery at most. If we consider that it is supposed to go for 30-40 days in smartwatch mode, that comes to 2.5-3.5% per day. Therefore, even with the level of activity mentioned above it should be no more than 4-6% per day. 10% per day is way way too much.


  • 0 6 months ago in reply to silentvoyager

    As above posted by silent voyager, I'd say it's more than expected, but without knowing your settings it's hard to say if that means there's possibly an issue....

    I've had the Fenix 6X, Fenix 7X solar and upgraded to the Enduro 3 on August, and haven't seen drain that high unless settings were maxed out.....

    If it were me I'd be checking the following:

    Check You are running the latest software v11.90 (there have been many updates that fixed battery drain since release) 

    Pulse ox set to on demand

    Wifi turned off 

    Backlight settings to 20-30% (it won't be as bright a an apple watch, but helps battery drain) 

    Set backlight to come on for screen/button touches, notifications etc, but choose "after Sunset" as that will only come on after dark when the

    Turn off gesture for backlight unless you love that feature as it drains a lot when you aren't even looking at the watch

    Set up a watchface so that it doesn't display frequently updated info (like seconds, heart rate etc... i.e. things that change the screen frequently as that uses more power) 

    When you are doing an activity switch away from map screen as that drains more apparently

  • +1 6 months ago in reply to zippyioa

    Hello

    It is possible that this is a normal battery drain. This depends on your usage as a whole. Yes, GPS activities will drain the battery more rapidly than outside of activities. Here are some other settings to consider as well.  

    The following will drain your watch more rapidly: 

    • Backlight brightness and duration
    • Music
    • Large number of notifications or alerts (sounds and/or vibrations)
    • Headphones usage
    • GPS activities (Satellite settings like Multiband, All Satellites etc. will increase the drain)
    • Some Connect IQ apps and watch faces
    • Animations (such as with Yoga workouts)
    • Pulse Ox either all day, or during sleep
    • Wi-Fi sync
      Here are some additional steps you can try, if you are seeing a one off battery drain out of the normal:
    • Try cleaning the contacts on the back of the watch and cable. For this we recommend using rubbing alcohol.
    • Try a hard reset. For this, hold the Light button until the watch shuts off, as opposed to selecting power off. Then power this on again.