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Is There A "Best" Older Firmware Version For Battery Life on a Garmin Forerunner 955 Solar?

partyman66
24 days ago

When I first bought this watch my battery life was great...  i only use it as a sportswatch and don't use it for notifications or other smartwatch activities aside from syncing my data to the Garmin servers.  I disconnect WIFI and bluetooth after syncing.  I did not do any updates for a full year after first getting the watch and then finally updated and Battery usage basically doubled after updating away from the firmware version that came with the watch.  I had done several more updates since then and it hasn't gotten much better.

My battery life isn't extremely bad, but it's still about half of what it was on the stock firmware from when I bought this watch in October of 2022, and the change wasn't gradual as if it was battery degradation. It happened immediately after getting that first firmware update.

I was toying with the idea of rolling back to Firmware version 15.19 because i could actually find the files for that version, but was wondering if anyone had any suggestions on a firmware version that is best to go to for battery life and general stability?  I don't need all the new features that came out in the past 3 years, I just want it to track runs, bike rides, sleep patterns, steps, and recovery.

  • 0 16 days ago

    Update:  I installed version 15.19 and set my watch up the way i usually do (geared for battery life optimization and function as a health/wellness monitoring device primarily), with no notifications, WIFI and Bluetooth off except for when i need to do a synchronization, and have my biometric monitors set to auto and GPS auto.  Battery life increase has been unbelievable in comparison to what it was on firmware version 22.22 (and many other versions that i tried over the past year).

    I've had this firmware installed for 2 days now.  I started at 100% charge the first day and went for a 56 minute run in the dark at night with GPS on auto and used up 5% battery, dropping it to 95% after the run.  I slept for 7 hours and it dropped another 1% to 94%, but then miraculously charged back up to 99% due to solar charging during my 20 minute drive to work.  This is the first and only time I've ever seen solar charging actually put charge back into my watch in the almost 3 years that i've had it.  It dropped another 1% over the day and then charged back up to 99% again when i was outside for about 5 minutes in the sun.  It then dropped from 99 to 96% over the course of the next 30 or so hours with almost no sunlight exposure and no additional workouts recorded yet (spent the entire day today inside working from home unfortunately).

    So over the past 42 hours since switching to firmware version 15.19 with 56 minute run and I am at 95% battery.  The newer firmwares that i have been using over the past year usually burn up about 6-9% battery from that run and then also drop about 6-8% per day just capturing biometric data about steps and pulse... and i never noticed any solar charging gain before.

    I'll report back in another week or so with more details.

    There is a pretty big negative to going with this old of a firmware though.... if you're into custom watch faces and apps, you really can't use any of them unless you find one you can sideload.  CIQ version on the watch is too low to support being able to push anything aside from new maps to it it.

  • 0 15 days ago in reply to partyman66

    Please post more usage reports. It will be interesting to hear your long-term impressions.

  • 0 15 days ago in reply to partyman66

    4 days + 8 hours now since last full charge (104 hours since last charge to 100% and 2 runs with GPS on totaling almost exactly 2 hours) and I'm at 86% battery.

    I was at 92% early this morning after exactly 96 hours and then went for a 63 minute run and dropped to 86% during that run. Slept for about 6.5 hours and woke up with the watch still at 86%.  I was exposed to about 20 minutes of direct sunlight during the day yesterday while at 93% battery and saw no battery percentage gain from it. 

  • 0 13 days ago in reply to partyman66

    Battery testing will have to be started over at 97% starting tonight since the watch started charging up from 86% as I was USB-cable transferring test versions of new software to it that I'm writing.  I wrote my own watch face specifically for this firmware that is compatible with CIQ version 4.2.2 (that's the CIQ version included in firmware bundle version 15.19 that i have on my watch now) so i could sideload it to the watch and have 5+ data fields on the screen where there is no seconds hand/field for the time readout in order to save battery.  My data fields are currently:

    -Weekday MONTH Day(Mon AUG 11)

    -Battery % with Battery icon that can change based on state green/yellow/red

    -Solar Charging %

    -Time with AM/PM

    -Total steps for the day

    I still have 2 open data fields on the watch face that i'm leaving empty for now and may fill in with something else if i can think of anything else relevant that won't cause battery drain (pulse causes battery drain, so not that).  I wish i could get sunrise/sunset and body battery to work, but those don't seem to want to cooperate with this version of CIQ.

  • 0 11 days ago in reply to partyman66

    Updated my custom watch face with these fields and some coding/behind-the-scenes efficiency improvements:

    -Weekday MONTH Day(Mon AUG 11)

    -Battery % with Battery icon that can change based on state green/yellow/red

    -Solar Charging %

    -Time with AM/PM

    -Last recorded pulse (not real-time.. to avoid waking up the heart rate sensor)

    -Body Battery %

    -Total steps for the day

  • 0 1 day ago

    It's been about 3 weeks now since rolling back to the old 15.19 FW version and using my own custom written watch face.  I burn about 2.5% battery per day on day that I don't don't  do any GPS training activity. This is about 1/2 to 1/3 of what newer firmwares use in the same conditions and settings.

    I highly recommend people try this version of FW if suffering from battery longevity wise with the newer firmwares.

  • 0 1 day ago in reply to partyman66

    Thanks again for your feedback. There's only one problem with your measurements: you're using solar charging extensively. I tested it thoroughly myself during a 14-day trip in the tropics, spending almost the entire day outdoors. Solar energy significantly changes battery life in good sunlight. I started the trip with a 100% charged battery, and after 14 days, it still had about 40% left. I didn't use GPS or Bluetooth during this time. Without solar energy, for example, in winter, the battery wouldn't have lasted that long, about 10 days without GPS. I don't know what firmware I had back then, but it wasn't as old as yours; it was about 1.5 years ago. So, I'm just pointing out that repeatable conditions are essential for battery testing.

  • 0 19 hours ago in reply to Orienteering runner

    I'm not sure what gave you the impression that I use solar charging extensively.  I barely benefit from solar charging at all with my usage pattern.. probably much less than most people.  Solar charging on this watch is basically a gimmick anyways.  I work inside every weekday and get little to no direct sunlight, doing most of my runs between the hours of 11 pm and 3 am in total darkness.

    The following 3 days of solar intensity charts show a typical weekday pattern for me.  Weekends are different.  Even if I were using solar charging (which I primarily am not), my usage patterns are the same with the newer firmwares and the current (older 15.19) version that I'm using, and my battery life has more than doubled consistently for over 3 weeks now with the 15.19 version compared to newer ones.  I even tried a hard reset with the newer firmwares and didn't find any noticeable improvement.

    You don't have to believe my results if you don't want to, but as a professional software engineer for 26 years, I am pretty good at running software through it paces and finding flaws. I highly encourage others to try this version of yourself and see if you notice a similar performance benefit.

    I also don't have the "low pulse for the first 7 minutes of a workout" bug with this firmware... A bug that seems to have been prevalent in most firmwares released for this watch for the past 18 months or more.

    Give it a shot... The only negative for me is the inability to install any newer watchface or app that requires CIQ versions newer than 4.4.

  • 0 10 hours ago in reply to partyman66

    In your first post describing battery benefits, you mentioned gain from solar charging twice. I thought that such sun exposure was standard for you. But okay, thanks for the more detailed description of how sun exposure actually affects your tests.

  • 0 6 hours ago in reply to Orienteering runner

    That was the weird thing about tthe first 2 days testing this firmware... I actually gained charge pretty much for the first time ever from slight solar exposure.  I drove to work in my car with my am in a normal position and noticed that when I got to work the charge level had gone up 3% in about 15-20 minutes max.  Maybe the battery was calibrating due to the new firmware sync hard reset.  That's about the only time I've ever gained a thing from solar charging.  Lithium batteries tend to be less accurate when estimating static voltage while under load at the upper threshold of the charge range so I could likely just just chalk it up to one of those factors.