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Not as promised battery life on 255s

9728506
over 2 years ago

Hi, 

yes I know it maybe needs some time indexing and also a few battery charges before being on 100% but in the first 2 days I notice a not as promised battery life. During 2h of configuring everything mostly through the app I lost 15% of battery life. Really not good but I did a lot of stuff with syncing many times via BT.

Now it has been about 2 days using the watch. Only one 45 cardio workout and one 45min walk with multiband on which didn't even take THAT much battery and I lost 25% more in around 2 days being at 60%. I know multiband cuts the gps battery life half but it was only 45min. And mostly not around many houses or trees. 

One thing to say is system brightness is very low on this device compared to my Fenix 6s Pro. When I need 20% on my 6s Pro I have 40% configured here for almost same brightness. I have BT turned off all the time, only twice a days turning it on for sync then off again. I have the device in airplane mode almost all the time. And I don't use pulseOX at all, have it turned to manually. The only thing taking battery life down is GPS Multiband which I don't use daily and mostly for around 45min when walking each second day. And 40% brightness because screen seems less bright then other device like my Fenix 6s Pro. 

Calculating this it would take me only to 8 days with one 45min workout each day. That is not the 12 days mentioned. And I barely use anything draining the battery. 

What about you other 255(s) users? Do you get the battery life promised, minus settings and maybe a day here or there with one charge?

Do you think it will get to normal after a few weeks like many claim with phones?

  • 0 over 2 years ago

    I have a full 255 not 255s and battery life seems OK. I have done multiple sessions over several hours with All systems + multiband GPS + indoor rides paired to a power meter with the watch controlling my trainer and so far battery life seems OK.

    I do not ever enable watch notifications as I do not need these annoyances and I do not use PulseOX.

    I always take a Garmin battery estimate and mentally divide by two as that seems to mirror my own real world experiences.

  • 0 over 2 years ago

    Using Multi band GPS you will only get "up to 13 hours". Using that almost halves the battery. 

  • 0 over 2 years ago

    Always take the advertised battery life with a pinch of salt - think how cars are advertised with their miles per gallon, it'll be a best case scenario. That initial 20% brightness will be part of that no doubt. 

    Also bear in the mind that 12 days doesn't include anything to do with GPS activity - that's why they also say 26 hours in GPS mode and 13 hours in dual band mode. That comes out of the same battery at the end of the day. Clearly the dual band is pretty heavy going, I'm not sure what the increased accuracy need is just for a walk? That 45 minutes at a rough calculation is about 5.8% battery used. For comparison if it did last 12 days it would use about 8.3% per day.

  • 0 over 2 years ago

    Today I only did one 30min walk, that's it, 30min walk multiband and I lost 25% in 10h. 

    There is something really strange going on. Never ever had problems with battery before.Not with my Fenix 6s Pro, with nothing. I did a hardreset after installing 10.10 and have everything turned off. 25% in 10h? lets say 5% for the walk makes it 20% in 10h. I haven't done anything different, nothing installed, really nothing. 

    If it stays that way I will sent the watch back and keep my 6s Pro. 

    And why walk and multiband? Well I have it on the watch, why not make use of it? Plus I live in the city and notice more accurate lines on the map ... I know it uses more GPS, around 5% in 60min on the 955 makes it maybe 5% in 45min on the 255s. Worth it. I am talking about worse battery life not because of multiband turned on. 

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to 9728506

    That doesn't sound right, I have done around 2.5 hours GPS today with All systems + multiband and while I didn't take before and after battery readings no way did I use anything close to 25% battery. This is with the 255 not 255s

    If you PM me a .FIT file I can upload it to DCRainmakers Analyser and I give you a battery usage chart.

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to 5135968

    That's nice of you but I don't know if it was GPS or something this day happened... 

    I will do a walk or ride tomorrow and will watch it, if it really is GPS but I don't think so as it wasn't the case yesterday, haven't lost much battery during yesterday's walk. 

    Maybe I will do a hardreset and if stays this way I will return it for sure. 

    EDIT: Something really weird I thought was an illusion of mine. Turning on airplane mode doesn't work. BT is still working, I just synced with my phone with 255s being in airplane mode. 

    MAJOR BUG! Maybe this is draining the battery too... 

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to 9728506

    How's about try the walk without multi band and compare the difference. At the moment the watch has been out 4/5 days so nobody knows how much you will actually get overall in reality, or if there's a battery drain issue somewhere. The 12 days is still smartwatch mode though, GPS isn't included in that. 8-10 days would be fine but again nobody knows yet. 

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to 9728506

    I don't think hard reseting is actually a good thing to keep doing tbh. That is going to kick off processes that start rebuilding your stats.

    Charge to 100% and don't worry about day to day or hourly consumption. See where you are in weeks time.

    Maybe take a photo of your watchface showing time and battery %, maybe each morning and before and after an activity?

    I know how annoying battery drain can be though!!

  • 0 over 2 years ago

    Last night my watch used around 1% overnight.

    That is better than I'd expect as the watch doesn't have a power saver mode (like my Fenix 6) that kicks in during sleep hours.

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to 5135968

    Mine used 5%. Defintely something wrong. Normal 255 only has 2 days more battery life so that can't be the reason. 

    When just saying 100% 12 days smartwatch mode, ok. I don't use anything like PulseOX and have airplane mode on. That would be around 8,3% per day in airplane mode. It used 5% only for sleeping 8h today. So I will  do a hardreset now and install Garmin Connect new. And I will for the first week turn off multiband. If this problem still persists I will sent the watch back. Have my Fenix 6s Pro here, so no big deal. Defintely not software if your 255 is ok. 

    As said I have seen that airplane mode sometimes isn't working, even though it is turned on. Can still sync via BT. No Go, esp because of EMF and sleep which is important to me.