Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Watch said to have 3-4 hours of battery life when continuously used
- Thread starter k3ith
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
- Status
Um how is that misleading?
"Our sources say that Apple is targeting 2.5 hours of heavy application use, such as processor-intensive gameplay, or 3.5 hours of standard app use. Interestingly, Apple expects to see better battery life when using the Watchs fitness tracking software, which is targeted for nearly 4 hours of straight exercise tracking on a single charge."
It's like an article titled "Macbook Air said to have 30 minutes of battery life while playing Crysis."
The Apple Watch continues to be said to last a day on a charge. What the article says is that during Apple's stress tests, the Watch lasts 3-4 hours.
No it would be like saying Macbook Air gets 12 hours of continuous video playback. Bye!
----------
Sure my iPhone gets 16 days of standby time. I'm sure that's the accurate way to measure it
No it would be like saying Macbook Air gets 12 hours of continuous video playback. Bye!
----------
Sure my iPhone gets 16 days of standby time. I'm sure that's the accurate way to measure it
No.
Just no.
Sure my iPhone gets 16 days of standby time. I'm sure that's the accurate way to measure it
It's not that complicated. The question is whether an average user can get through the day without having to recharge the device. You can expect that to be the case with the iPhone (although I can easily drain the battery when using GPS to track a long bike ride) as it is the case with the watch, simply because throughout the day you'll only briefly interact with it. You're not going to watch a movie on your watch.
Right, but if I'm doing cardio at the gym for an hour after work and then heading to dinner, it seems like there might not be much battery left to even check the time. And this is with very limited amount of apps running on the watch itself.
You have to take into account the differing usage patterns. A small laptop is meant to be worked on for long periods of time, but play a super-intensive game on it and battery life will suffer. An iPhone is meant to last all day with small periods of usage, but use it constantly and battery life will suffer. A smart watch is meant to be used infrequently for very short periods of time. Use it more often and battery life will suffer.
DOA for fitness people if this is true. 4 hours automatically excludes it from endurance use of any kind. Even for short workouts, it seems that the battery will be hit pretty hard. Obviously, it is rumor and speculation, but if this is true, it seems to me like making it through a day would not be a given for many people. Also makes me wonder how the battery will hold up to 3rd party apps.
No.
Dare I bite?
You are not constantly interacting with your watch while you are the gym, therefore the limited amount of apps running are not even actually running during that period of standby time.
At most, there is low-level OS activity to manage connections, hardware, and tasks not available to apps running in the background. We can't even guarantee a lot of the activity during standby time is even happening on the watch, since it is very good at offloading processing to iPhone. Generally, it is safe to say that anything running while in a low-power state is designed to use as little as possible.
It does? Maybe we read different articles. According to the article, a 1 hour workout would leave you with less than 75% battery. The way the article puts it, you would be using something like 75% just to get through a normal day. If true, it sounds to me like battery could be a major problem. The first time the watch dies at 7 o'clock and you are out until 10, it becomes unreliable. Watches can't be unreliable.
Of course, no one will really know until it launches and is tested in the real world. Interesting article nonetheless.
Exactly. Of course Apple has to stress test the device but that's not going to equal real world usage.
Previously we have been told the Heart-Rate monitoring on Watch would be passively tabbing information, not just while the watch is "active".
Therefore, if that is true, then Watch's standby includes power given to those components to sustain a guesstimated three days.
First, heart rate monitoring is only one aspect of what gets recorded when working out. Second, the article specifically states "...nearly 4-hours of straight exercise tracking..." A one hour workout sounds to me like it would eat over 25% of the battery. Perhaps I am reading it wrong? Seems clear, though.
What changes between collecting health information during the day and collecting health information during a work out? I used heart monitoring because it is a metric that requires the same attention (battery expense) regardless of actively or passively collected.
But I am seriously asking as the only thing I can think is that rate of information collected and potentially the rate of that information over time.
With that in mind, can we only expect a 4-8 hour period of passively collecting health information, then? Did they not expect that function to play a role in the three days of standby use?
In reality, I think I have a lot of issues with using this article as a source for battery times when a lot of base-level questions aren't solved.
[Mod Note]
Please continue the discussion in the news thread.
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1840285/
Please continue the discussion in the news thread.
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1840285/
- Status