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Significant battery drain for Vivoactive 3 after 7.70 firmware update

I am not sure when exactly my Vivoactive 3 updated to version 7.70. But it was sometime recently. And for the last few days I am noticing that the battery life of my Vivoactive 3 has gone down significantly! I am only getting about 1 day of battery life on a full charge, sometimes even less than 24 hours!

My watch is more than 2.5 years old and when I measured my battery life a month or two ago, I was easily getting more than 5 days on a full charge with heart rate measurement on. And I believe I was getting around 5 days on a full charge even a few weeks ago. But this week I am suddenly noticing less than a day of battery! I am very upset with this sudden and massive decrease in battery life. Looking at the forums here, it seems like many people are experiencing poor battery life with the latest update. I am very disappointed with Garmin for this poor quality update and I really hope they fix it so that my watch is usable again! It is such a great device and I am upset that bad software updates may be causing such massive problems! Please fix it!

  • Charging three times a week with 12 hours of activity is not that bad, let's see for how long it will last, until the next update or more. Thanks and good luck.

  • Hi 8390248, regarding Coros Pace 2 please look at DCRainmaker

    https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2020/09/coros-pace-2-in-depth-review-multisport-running-power.html

    Hi all, regarding draining VA3 I emailed support Germany week ago and contacted via phone. Besides (spoken) offer to buy refurbished there is no help and no reaction/ no email, nothing. On the phone it was suggested to do a so-called "Master-Reset", they wanted to send instructions which, I never received as promised - I figured out how to do this (a little complicated and hard to find in the web), but it did not change anything (seems not to be more than factory reset). So, sorry, I cannot recommend or forward this as an option.

    Other suggestions out there?

  • I am constantly recharging this watch and I got it at the end of February 2021. I run between 40-60 minutes 4 times a week with factory settings, basic watch face, minimal backlight, and no vibration or wrist gesture. To advertise this watch as getting 7 days is a bold face lie. I have to charge this watch at least once a day and all Garmin can offer is a used one to replace a brand new watch. 

  • I am constantly recharging this watch and I got it at the end of February 2021. I run between 40-60 minutes 4 times a week with factory settings, basic watch face, minimal backlight, and no vibration or wrist gesture. To advertise this watch as getting 7 days is a bold face lie. I have to charge this watch at least once a day and all Garmin can offer is a used one to replace a brand new watch. 

  • Thanks Joen! THat was a valuable experience. So we know there's nothing can be done at users' side. I checked DC Rainmaker's review but still can't figure out if it will have a marathon training plan like Garmin Coach of Polar Programs. Can you check please? It should be on their website but added to one's account or something like that.

  • I just recently updated to 7.70 and am having a similar battery drain issue. My watch is only holding charge for less than 12 hours, no GPS used at all. Based on comments in this forum, it seems like this update has been around for over a month, and no fix yet. This doesn't give me confidence in Garmin's support.

  • This is straight forward, but I agree!

    Did anyone else notice that things/processes are ON in the background in the watch that you did not choose or cannot switch off?? For me it is vibration of watch at beginning and stop of activities. There must be something running in the background that drains power (sensors/sync/whatever) ... that was not switched on by the user. Has anyone experience with the inbuilt hardware diagnostics at this watch?

  • If you look through the list of topics for viviactive 3 Series you will notice the battery drain threads appeared 4 years ago and they were emerging after some updates. The only solution from Garmin - go to factory settings or get a refurbished piece for half the price of a new watch. So probably the answer is not as simple as hardware management...

  • I tried the 7.50 versions without success on my 2 years old watch. I re-install the 7.70 versions and i noticed that other software are identical (GPS, WHR, ...) and may be one of this software is in fault.

  • Hi, idea behind my "question to the audience" about inbuilt-diagnostic was, if something running/weird can be deduced from any of those "test-pages" on the watch.

    8390248, I am on you side: it is no hardware problem, maybe it is also not firmware itself - otherwise all users would complain - maybe sync or update process itself that caused the fault in certain circumstances for some users, e.g. when unintendedly interrupted. I will leave it to Garmin to find out and ask the right questions and check from here.