Getting a handle on Battery Impacts

It sure seems like *any* Bluetooth connection while using GPS will burn though about 10% battery per hour as well.  Bluetooth connection to the phone for example.   I ran a 2.5 hour trail run recently, usual settings, carrying my phone in a pack, but no music and I burned through about 25% on that run.

badbri

BT shouldn't burn that much. The phone connection uses Bluetooth Low Energy protocol, which is very low power drain - sends small packets of data periodically, then the chip shuts down. Bluetooth audio is a different protocol, with large amounts of data requiring virtually continuous chip uptime (and consequent battery hit)

Not disputing your figures, but something else must have been going on.

Right.  I would sure like to figure it out as I don't get anywhere near the battery drain rates I'm seeing on here in day to day use.  The best I ever see is .2-.3% per hour on occasion but my long term average is about .9-1% or 4 days total.  I average at least 1 hour of GPS use a day though.

No SP02 and all other settings on lowest settings AFAIK.

I've been trying to maximize the battery life during my runs, as I sometimes do runs up to 100 hours for races. Also need to keep the GPS accuracy (so no ultratrac) and I want to still be able to navigate and see my heart rate. I use about 3 percent an hour, displaying 4 fields I care about: battery level, heart rate, distance, and time of day. If I change my display to fields that CHANGE more often, I get more battery drain. For instance if I go with" time, pace, distance, and heart rate, I get about 4 percent battery drain an hour. So that minor change in display makes my watch go from 33+ hours to about 24 hours. Oh, and I use GPS, not combined with any of the other satelites. Not sure if that has an impact. Here's my take on some of the other features you were interested in:

- Carrying a phone thus a constant Bluetooth connection:  I tell my watch to not provide notifications 

- 1 sec recording vs "Smart" recording: not seen a difference

- Navigating a course with a map field included in available data fields; when I do navigation, it becomes a data field I can see when I want. I typically only go to that field rarely, instead usually I use the little red arrow that moves around the perimeter of the watch on my normal display to navigate

- Navigating a course withOUT a map field included in available data fields.: didn't think this was possibe, but maybe I don't get your point

- Using a Map field as an available data field but NOT Navigating a course.: kind of what I typically do. I don't think it makes much of a battery drain, if any if you never go to that navigation field. The little red arrow that moves around your normal display seems to not make a battery drian difference.

- Climbpro?: I've scrolled to this occassionally, but again I think since I use it only a few times during a run I don't notice a battery issue.

- Autoclimb? nope, not looked into

To summarize, to maximize battery life during a run, try limiting fields displayed that don't change often.

Good info, thanks.

I did a recent long long run using the following settings and burned 55% of battery in 9.5 hours.  I am baffled as to how I am supposed to get 24+ hours but your suggestion about constantly changing data fields might be one of the ways.  I use a CIQ data field that shows 7 different metrics, several of which (HR, power, paces, etc) are constantly changing.

Here are the settings I had for that run:

- Phone with me, but Bluetooth OFF.

- Watch navigating, however turn by turn notifications OFF and I only looked at the map page sparingly.

- GPS only, no glonass or galileo

- Lap notifications set for each mile (vibrate & sound)

- ANT+ devices connected:  Stryd, Scosche HRM, Tempe

- OHR OFF so no Spo2 etc

Did a 15h10min hike today, accidentally hat bluetooth on (but my phones bluetooth was off)

circled through all data screens ocassionally (hr gauge, map, ascent / descent gauge, standard screen with elevation and total ascent, time and distance)

GPS only

no SPO2

No CIQ Datafields (my assumption is, they are a battery burner, just as everything that is non native)

no navigation (noticed navigation is also a battery burner, both on my edge830 and the forerunner, that's just normal I think and can also be observed on other devices)

had 54% battery left

That's excellent, extrapolates out to over 30 hours of total life.  I'm getting the impression CIQ data fields cause a fair sized hit.  As a Stryd user I have to have 1 installed, and I usually add 1 other as well.  Good to know if I ever decide to go for 20+ hours.

So I experimented this weekend with some new settings.  Same as on my 9.5 hour run from a couple months ago, but with some small tweaks.  I took away my main CIQ data field (still had the Stryd one though) and I had no navigation running, and I disabled auto-lap (but I manually lapped instead).  All of the rest of these were the same:

- Phone with me, but Bluetooth OFF on the watch.

- GPS only, no glonass or galileo

- ANT+ devices connected:  Stryd, Scosche HRM, Tempe

- OHR OFF so no Spo2 etc

At the end of 11.5 hours of running I still had 55% battery remaining.  That extrapolates to 25.5 hours of total use and is a significant increase over my previous attempt where I had only 45% left after 9.5 hours of running.  The CIQ datafield and/or navigation must've made the difference.  

Well that's a little better. I also did a run recently and disabled bluetooth on my watch, leaving my data fields as I described above. Went for an 8 hour run. Seemed to move my battery usage from 33+ hours to more like 36 hours total. I also use the autolap feature, so I think your disabling that feature likely has little impact (I only have a beep notification, not vibrate). While you probably really want the ANT+devices, I'm thinking that's your biggest battery drain. You should try and not wear them a run, using your watch's heart rate monitor instead (but not the Sp02) as an experiment.