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i wonder if different watch faces provide different battery life, maybe something with a bright white background or a lot going on with complications will run your battery down a bit faster than one with a few complications?

I wondered about this too so awhile back I conducted my own unofficial test on my S4. I removed all complications on the watch face I saw a modest improvement in battery life. I would imagine it has to do with apps constantly updating in the background? I haven't tried it on my S5 though.
 
I am out of my return period but I have had two workouts where my battery life dropped 1% per minute, so 40% in 40 mins. This was just so bad I thought it must be software so I was awaiting 6.1 before doing anything more. Now from your post it seems it could be hardware related. If this is true then there will be a lot of people affected. Not happy.

but if you have that kind of loss they will exchange for you anyway, apple will make it right in store.
 
I know one thing, is that workouts on LTE will kill the battery quick! I dropped from 95% to 72% after a 1 hour walk.

It does. That is almost what Apple has promised (5 hours). I have noticed that those workouts I use LTE only + music or podcast over LTE, I loose about 20% / hour. So I could almost run a marathon.. or not.
 
but if you have that kind of loss they will exchange for you anyway, apple will make it right in store.
I am hopeful for a solution and if it comes to that I will be asking for an exchange but I want to get to the root cause of this issue and to find a solution for others that will also experience this issue.
In search of a root cause I did another workout for 40 mins today and the only difference was I turned off cellular and the battery only dropped only 8% instead of 40% like the other two times.
The ONLY difference to usage on the other days was turning off cellular. So I think that having cellular on without a phone nearby in an area with poor reception really affects battery life on my watch.
I would really like to know if there is a hardware difference between the LTE modem in series 5 to series 4 or if this is just a software bug that is trying too hard and affects both series 4 and 5.
Of course the other answer is that I actually do have faulty LTE hardware and would benefit from an exchange.
Can others please post their experience with workouts with a cellular version in poor reception areas.
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It does. That is almost what Apple has promised (5 hours). I have noticed that those workouts I use LTE only + music or podcast over LTE, I loose about 20% / hour. So I could almost run a marathon.. or not.
I am loosing about 60% per hour with a workout and NOT streaming over LTE just from the storage on the watch but yes LTE is on.
 
It does. That is almost what Apple has promised (5 hours). I have noticed that those workouts I use LTE only + music or podcast over LTE, I loose about 20% / hour. So I could almost run a marathon.. or not.
I am loosing about 60% per hour with a workout and NOT streaming over LTE just from the storage on the watch but yes LTE is on.
 
Of course the other answer is that I actually do have faulty LTE hardware and would benefit from an exchange.
Can others please post their experience with workouts with a cellular version in poor reception areas.
Your numbers seem high. I've seen a 29% drop over an hour's outdoor run with GPS+LTE+streaming+bluetooth in a mid-to-poor reception area. A 75 minute run in an okay LTE area saw 39% battery drain. I've seen 45 minute runs drain by 32% and by 15% - former was streaming, latter was playing music from the watch's storage.

I'd get the watch looked at.
 
60% an hour? With no phone and just data?
Something is wrong. I did 30 minutes on the bike today indoors using the stock app and I think I used about 5%.

An update..
AOD on and raise to wake off except for during 30 minute workout (raise to wake on).

Just under 19 hours of standby. 2:40 of usage and 53% remaining. If it made it to 2PM that would be 50% in 24 hours but it wil come up a few hours short of that. Likely around 21 hours standby with 3 hours of usage at 50%. Not bad IMO.
 
Mine is better post-exchange, but still pretty not-great. Off the charger for just over 2.5 hours today and down 11%. Have not even used it, as far as I can remember.
 
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Mine is better post-exchange, but still pretty not-great. Off the charger for just over 2.5 hours today and down 11%. Have not even used it, as far as I can remember.
FWIW, I've seen my S4 do 4% per hour on WatchOS5 as well, seemingly doing nothing, though usually more in the mid to low 3%/hr range.
 
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my "yesterday" results

100% at 6:30 AM

10 min. conversation away from phone,

30 min workout while streaming music (no phone connected)

normal use throughout the day (texting, etc...)

watch was hung up with 30% remaining at 10:00 PM.

overall i'm ok with my results so far.

I also have raise to wake and most all of the default settings on.
 
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Wtf is going on...two days in a row my watch has died before 9pm.

it was on only 18% and just died from 18%....this is just madness and not sure why

just put it on the charger and it starts charging on 17%...why would it die at 18%? surely not a reset will be needed?
 
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Apple really needs to release an update and squash some bugs. Today my AW would only charge to 98% even though I knew it was fully charged.. it was at 98% FOREVER. I removed from the charger, on/off, back to charger and *poof* 100%. Did this twice today.
 
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Answered several times in other threads. Search for term airplane mode.
Sorry, but my S3 with watchOS 5, fly mode Put bluetooth Connection OFF and disconnect from iPhone. Why My S5 with watchOS 6.0.1 don’t turn OFF bluetooth?
 
Sorry, but my S3 with watchOS 5, fly mode Put bluetooth Connection OFF and disconnect from iPhone. Why My S5 with watchOS 6.0.1 don’t turn OFF bluetooth?
Turn Airplane on, on the Watch. Then go Bluetooth settings on the Watch and turn it off. Then Airplane mode on. Next time you hit Airplane on the Watch, BT goes off. Do this all on the Watch.
 
Turn Airplane on, on the Watch. Then go Bluetooth settings on the Watch and turn it off. Then Airplane mode on. Next time you hit Airplane on the Watch, BT goes off. Do this all on the Watch.
Thank you very much avkam, I did not know this since I never had to do it in my old S3.

This is my second S5, since the previous one in airplane mode consumed me 20-25% of battery and Apple has replaced it, so now I am trying to see what happens with this version so that it does not last the same as the S3
 
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As a reference point to the many posts above. Fully charged, S4AL, wOS 6.0.1 - 2% loss after 3 hours, low activity, but many complications, including W Noise.

After 2 more hours, including 1 hour cycling 90%
 
Something is wonky about the battery reporting. Some mornings my Watch stays on 100% for a couple of hours, and then other days it drops to 99% within 20 minutes of taking it off the charger. My usage is exactly the same every morning.
 
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