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Varia Radar App - Allow Phone Sound ONLY and turn display off to save phone battery

I use an RTL 515 with a Garmin Edge 1000. The edge 1000 alert sound isn't very loud (it is louder in later 1030 etc).

I have started using the Varia Radar app on my iPhone so that the alert tones can be heard clearly through my Aftershokz bone conduction headphones, but over a 4 to 5 hour ride, the battery drain on the phone is excessive, using up to 70%! 

If the Varia Radar App could be set to give Audible Alerts ONLY then I assume the battery drain on the phone would be reduced.

Do any other headphone users feel this would be useful?

  • Yes it would.

    So stupid of Garmin to send it out as media instead of notification. If I raise media, it will also increase my music which is set to around 30%. If notification is used instead I can set that to 100% and overhear the music. 

    Wahoo elemnt computer is very low too so I can't hear the tones in wind with my tinnitus. 

    support.garmin.com/.../

  • Since the release of a recent update the iPhone Varia App (2.1.0 29) battery drain has dropped ENORMOUSLY! Thank you Garmin!

  • Hi , are you referring to the battery of the radar itself or your phone?

  • Im referring to the drain on the phone battery when the radar app is running and connected by Bluetooth to the radar light RTL 515 Slight smile

  • I’ve now had one instance of high battery drain since updating the app, but I’ve been away for a week and will start checking again now I’m back and riding again. 
    All I use the phone App for is to send audible warnings to my bone conduction headphones. So I don’t have my iPhone screen open at all during my rides (40 - 60 miles usually) . 

  • After sending phone screen shots to Garmin, we've worked out what's really happening here :-) 

    If the screen on my phone doesn't go off when I put it in my back pocket during a ride then battery drain is high (60% drain on a battery that has 83% Battery Health).

    If I turn my screen off, then for a 60 mile ride the iPhone battery drain is only about 2% with the Varia App in the background. So as long as you only want the audible alerts and don't need to see the warnings on the phone screen, all is well :-)

    If, however, you want to view the app on screen throughout your ride - significant phone battery drain can be expected - turning down the brightness will help :-)

    In an ideal world, there would be an option in the Varia App to have audible alerts ONLY without any onscreen display :-)

    With thanks to Garmin support. It should have been obvious to me, but wasn't ;-) 

  • I've been thinking more about this and it appears that the Varia Radar App actually PREVENTS the iPhone from going to sleep. I can imagine a case for that, as if using the phone attached to your handlebars with the intention of viewing the alerts you wouldn’t want to phone to keep sleeping.

    If that IS the case then it would be good if there was an in app option to override that for cases like mine and also for those who would ride with the phone in their pocket and have the volume turned up simply to hear the audible alerts.