Why is my Lumia 950 battery draining?

[Jcmg62]

I'm experiencing huge battery drain issues...like from 100% to dead within 5 hours of regular use. I've had the phone for a month and have the latest (insider) OS and the most recent firmware update.

I get that the answer here is probably to disable some of the background apps, but frankly that feels like a cheat. My Lumia 1520 might have had a slightly bigger battery, but it was also powering a bigger screen, had windows 10 running on it and had nearly twice as many apps running in the background and would still give me a full day without dying by lunchtime.

If this is a software issue, MS need to find a fix and push it out. If it's hardware related, they should be sticking a free spare battery in the box.

 

[antiochian2010]

Re: Lumia 950 Battery Drain question

Two days ago, my 950 (US Dual SIM Unlocked) started battery drain and screen kept emitting heat. Battery pull and setting changes not effective.
Did hard reset. Firmware update appeared in phone updates.
Phone is now operating normally.. No drain.. Screen is cool as a cucumber again..

 

[TheGerg]

I'm trying to stay optimistic but after a few days of having the Lumia 950 and not being able to use Windows Hello and turning the screen brightness to 20% my battery has drained about 2% less fast. I've just stopped about 85% of my background apps and disabled my most favorite feature from the 1520 the Glance Screen we will see what battery life this phone will allow me now. I'm starting to feel like everyone else, I've paid a lot of money for this phone and it's very, very sub-par in relation to how well my 1520 has worked for me for almost two years. I also wanted to add that the .29 update did very little to my battery life.



I will update in a couple days to see what the battery life is like then.

 

[realwarder]

I'm experiencing huge battery drain issues...like from 100% to dead within 5 hours of regular use. I've had the phone for a month and have the latest (insider) OS and the most recent firmware update.

I get that the answer here is probably to disable some of the background apps, but frankly that feels like a cheat. My Lumia 1520 might have had a slightly bigger battery, but it was also powering a bigger screen, had windows 10 running on it and had nearly twice as many apps running in the background and would still give me a full day without dying by lunchtime.

If this is a software issue, MS need to find a fix and push it out. If it's hardware related, they should be sticking a free spare battery in the box.

Use the built in web interface in the developer section to monitor processes in the phone. You can see if something is using a lot of CPU.

 

[ajayden]

We are doing an analysis of battery consumption stats from different WM10 devices. Please post screenshots of your battery usage screens on the following thread.

http://forums.windowscentral.com/wi...post-your-wm10-battery-usage-screenshots.html

 

[Csederquist]

I had the same issue with my 950 that I got on the first day of release in November. On this past Wednesday I went back to activation of my older 920 so I could play and explore the battery issue on the 950. After a couple of hours of investigation and trial and error testing. I was able to resolve the battery issue. I have advised my local AT&T retail store and have reactivated the 950. Problem solved. For those who want to try what I did here is what I found:

1. The Lumia 950 out of the box has a battery charging bug that limits battery operating life and over heating unless the Operating System build (firmware) is upgraded to 10.0.10586.29 or higher. All 950’s should be checked and upgraded if necessary prior to retail release. To upgrade it MUST be initiated from a previously un-started phone or FACTORY RESTART is necessary before the OS upgrade is initiated. Firmware upgrade from reboot or a hard reboot will not initiate the upgrade properly.

2. There is also a synchronizing issue between Outlook, Calendar and Cortana if the Microsoft account setup is not initiated first before other phone functions including third party APPs and Cortana are set up.

3. In addition, if extra memory SD micro chip is used to complement the phone device internal memory, Only use the extra SD chip memory for storing photos, videos, music and documents. Do not save APPs to this memory. I found that it is better to keep the APPs stored on the phone internal memory. Some dedicated Microsoft 950 APPs will not operate properly from the external memory chip.

Hope this helps some that are experiencing the issues that I did.

 

[YKinase]

Thanks for the troubleshooting Csederquist. As soon as the new firmware is released, I'll follow your steps. Do you have any evidence for the bug or are your postulating its existence based on the success of your re-installation? I'm curious what you tried that didn't work.
Also, to your point #2: is this simply a matter of logging in with you MS account during phone setup or is there an additional, important step?

Cheers

 

[Csederquist]

YKinase - On my success only, I had no evidence of a bug just my own short battery life and overheating and the other responses on this issue read in this user forum. Firmware 10.0.10586.29 is already available. Do a Factory Restart and then initiate upgrade. Set up the phone from scratch again just as you first did when you opened the box.

As to second point, no additional step, this is a matter of following the sequence of the start up procedure. I first made the mistake of bypassing setting up the MS Account because I already had one and did it latter after setting up Outlook, Calendar and Cortana. This loused up synchronizing between them and OutLook didn't work properly for me . . . . so had to Restart all over again to correct.

If you are having the same battery life issues I did, then it is worth a try, you will just loose what you have already set up and have to repeat installing your third party APPs and addresses. Let us know if it solves your battery issues for you as well.

Regards

 

[YKinase]

Thanks Csederquist! By the way, you mentioned Firmware, but 10.0.10586.29 is the latest public release of the OS. I'm still waiting for the firmware upgrade .15506. (I'm an insider) but it did just show up in WDRT, so I may go that route.

Cheers!

 

[Csederquist]

When I did Step 1. as I outlined in my first message, and selected upgrade, firmware upgrade 10.0.10586.29 loaded automatically.

Regards

 

[robert peake]

I've a straneg issue as I just tried what you have suggested form the storage app I have looked what I have stored for the SD card and apps and games I have 5.22 gb on the card. When you click on the apps and games it says that there is no apps found. I do have games installed on my phone but for some reason this does not pick them up in the search.,

 

[anon(2824992)]

Setting the "Glance Screen" to 30 seconds instead of "Always on" seemed to make a very big difference for me. I read that tip somewhere the other day (can't remember exactly where).

 

[anon(2824992)]

I saw that suggestion on All About Windows Phone. They have a complete article available today with many battery-saving tips.

 

[Shkupjani]

I saw that suggestion on All About Windows Phone. They have a complete article available today with many battery-saving tips.

I use flip case. when I close the case it will be off because of the sensor.