Related
This discussion has been locked.
You can no longer post new replies to this discussion. If you have a question you can start a new discussion

Sudden, Inexplicable Battery Drain on FR 255?

Nalorin
11 months ago

I bought a Forerunner 255 about a month ago (my Amazon return window literally closed yesterday). I've been loving it due to its exceptional battery life and its sunlight-readable transflective display. I spent a week tweaking it to just how I liked it, and it had been working swimmingly for about 2 weeks since then.

--> I haven't changed any settings since I got it setup how I like it, about 3 weeks ago. <--

I use the GPS feature 2-3 times/week when I can get outside, for up to 90 minutes each time, and the battery was lasting 6-7 days, with 10-15% left over when I started each charge cycle. The battery would normally drop about 4-5% overnight and another 4-5% during the day. I had O2 and Heart Rate set to 24/7, and HRV set to overnight. If I didn't use the GPS at all, I suspect I could have gotten 10-12 days of life out of a full charge.

8 days ago, I had fully charged it again. Then, the next morning, I noticed that the battery had dropped by about 8%. By the afternoon, it had dropped another 10%. By the time that 5 days had passed (4 hours shy of 5 days, to be precise), my battery was at 3%, and I hadn't used the GPS that week at all (the weather was bad). I charged it fully again, and the battery declined in the same fashion.

Yesterday, evening (about 7 pm) I charged the watch fully, again. By 2 pm the next day (19 hours), the battery life had dropped by 28%. IN ONE DAY ~without~ GPS usage!!!

I've tried charging it again today, and let it sit on the charger for an additional hour (to trickle-charge). I put it back on my wrist 2 hours ago, and it's already down to 97% again. Before all of these issues, it would drop to maybe 94-96% overnight (about 10 hours) from a full charge. Now it's doing half of that in just 2 hours. That's about 2.5x faster battery draw!

Because I have not changed ANY settings in the past 3 weeks, I suspect that this behaviour is firmware related. Any suggestions on how to resolve it? The current firmware on the watch is 18.27

Disabling PulseOx, HR and HRV are not options, as I'm using the watch for tracking health metrics related to a chronic illness.

  • 0 11 months ago

    I just opened a case with Garmin Customer Support for the same exact issue. My issue began 1 week ago & I was losing 20% literally overnight. Garmin had me switch the Pulse Ox to On Demand to test it for a few days & now I'm only losing 4% in 24 hrs, but that still doesn't correct the issue. 

    Also a 255, 8 months old, no GPS tracking, current firmware.

  • 0 11 months ago in reply to jeeterpuppy

    If that corrected the battery drain, and you have the exact same problem, then that seems to confirm that the firmware is the issue, likely the most recent update. They probably screwed something up with the 24hr pulseox in the latest firmware release. 

    Thanks for your reply.

  • 0 11 months ago

    Also, if you haven't tried it: Hold the light button until the watch switches off, and then switch it back on. This restart can sometimes help if the watch is stuck in something, draining power. 

  • 0 11 months ago

    I have the same issue!  My 255s battery used to last for over a week, but since the last firmware update it does not last more than a day (with no GPS usage)

  • 0 11 months ago

    Mine's still on 18.26. It doesn't seem to be updating via the Connect app and I'm not going to plug it into Garmin Express now. I also don't have pulse ox on 27/7, so it might be fine when it eventually updates.

  • 0 11 months ago

    If you can tolerate it, it might be worth experimenting with generally disabling data connections and only reenabling to sync the locally stored measurements once in a while. This could help tease out whether it is really the Pulse-Ox sensing mode itself that is eating power, or something about how it syncs those results to Garmin Connect. I suggest this only because a lot of other instabilities and power drain problems in past firmware updates have seemed related to communication malfunctions.

  • 0 11 months ago

    Same problem here, lost 40% overnight. I have Pulse Ox on during sleep but it wasn't a problem before. Don't think it's a fw update problem because mine was a bit out of date I think. I just updated in case it will help and now it's at 18.26 so I guess I was having the problem on 18.25.

  • 0 11 months ago

    Did a reset of my watch and it fixed the issue

  • 0 11 months ago

    Same thing here except much worse. I charged it fully yesterday and it had started saying 8 Days. Halfway through the day it said 4 days. I woke up this morning and it was completely depleted.

  • 0 10 months ago

    The 255 has been the worst watch I've ever owned, honestly I don't think I'll buy a garmin again (and I've had quite a few) first it was the heart rate dropping about 50% during a run bug that went on for months. Now for the last few weeks it's been rapid battery drain overnight.

    Awful watch, wish I have never 'upgraded' from the 245