Real world battery life: Samsung Galaxy S23
or: Samsung Galaxy S23 vs. Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra
NB: Due to popular demand, I'll update this daily for the first 2 weeks!
Wednesday the 1st of February Samsung presented their new lineup of Galaxy devices. The day after I bought the Samsung Galaxy S23.
The last year, I've had the Galaxy S22 Ultra, and before that the Galaxy S21 Ultra.
I've been really happy about the Ultras, because of:
their battery life (especially the S21 Ultra!)
But I got tired of having such a huge phone. Would the battery life of the smallest phone in the lineup disappoint me?
I bought the phone Thursday afternoon, and spent the rest of the day transferring data to it from my previous phone. I have lots of data, so it took quite a while, even though the Samsung Smart Switch makes it very easy. But this day doesn't really count.
My normal weekday comes with a few morning standup meetings using Teams, which is known to be really power hungry. During the day I've used my phone as internet connection, old school dialing, a fair share of messaging (primarily via Signal and old school SMS), reading news in the breaks and in the evening.
And my Fridays are even more power hungry than the rest of the weekdays, because I usually have around 1.5 hours of Teams meetings, the first part while commuting (thus using cell data).
The first full day with the new Galaxy S23 was a Friday, so I was really curious about the battery life (the S22 didn't really get great reviews on this account, but the S23 has slightly bigger battery pack, and according to specs a more power efficient processor).
By the way - I always turn on the battery saver function on my smartphones, to ensure the battery works for as many years as possible. This means the Galaxies only charge to 85%.
After the full workday - the S23 still had 40% left. And I spent more power than a normal Friday, because I had to post-install and setup 5-10 apps which I didn't auto-install via the Smart Switch app.
I got up at 7am, and before I went to bed at around 1am there were a little more than 20% left (I spent some time in the evening playing Chess.com).
My S22 Ultra usually had around 40-45% left in the evening - but perhaps 30% after heavy usage. For my usage, 20% vs. 30% after a day of heavy usage is fine - as long as it lasts a full day (and again - I don't charge to 100%).
18 hours of above normal daily usage, 65% battery juice spent. This means I could use it for around 27 hours on a charge, if I charged it to 100%.
I've used my phone around what I normally do a weekend day, perhaps a tiny bit less.
I disconnected it from the charger 8 hours ago, and it still has 70% left. This means less than 2% battery usage per hour (15%/8h)!!
Turned off the phone at 1:30am with 47% left, that's 38% during more than 16 hours. I played a chess app for around 1 hour before going to sleep. Around 42 hours on a full charge.
Didn't use the phone much today, just some messaging, reading news, checking weather forecasts, a bit of googling, looking at old photos and playing a couple of games of chess.
Stopped using the S23 after 14 hours of no charging. Still 64% on the battery, which means 21% down, which again means 1.5% down per hour, and would mean that it could be turned on for more than 60 hours with this light usage, if charged to 100%.
Off the charger at 7am. Checking a bit of news and messages.
Teams meetings using the phone from 8:45am until 10am around 30 minutes of these while commuting. At 10am the battery drained from 85% to 73%.
Leaving the phone in the charger until tomorrow, after around 16 1/4 hours, and battery is at 49%. Except from the above average Teams meetings in the morning, I've used it just like any other normal day.
36%/16h is approximately 2.25% per hour, giving around 44 hours on a full charge.
Until now I'm actually quite impressed!
Started the day with 1h 15mins of Teams meetings, the first 35 minutes using cellular. 1h of the meetings was with video and/or screen sharing.
Then came a day of what is for me normal usage. Messaging, news, a short chess game.
During the day and afternoon I had some phone calls.
In the evening I had 57% left, before I attended a meetup via Zoom. The zoom meeting had video (mine was turned off most of the time though). The meeting was 1 hour, and half of that was over cellular.
After that I played a bit more chess and did a bit more messaging.
Now that I'll soon head to bed, the phone still has 41%, and has been on battery for 16.75 hours. That's 44%/16.75h = 2.63% per hour (38 hours on a full charge).
A good pattern is showing!
Today was a day of a somewhat normal usage for me. Perhaps a tiny bit less than normal via Teams.
Had my daily standups, approximately 30 minutes in Teams via cellular. Then a couple of phone calls, Signal-calls, recorded some video, then another phone call on my way back home. Plus normal messaging use (remember that I'm not a teenager, so I don't snap 5 times every 5 minutes ;)).
I played a couple of chess games, and read a bit on the phone in the evening.
Now it's been on battery for almost 17 hours, and it still has 50% left, meaning 35% down, which is around 2.1% per hour. That totals around 47 hours on a full charge.
Oh yeah - and today I picked up one of the original Samsung silicone cases. It's really nice and snug looking, super simple and clean. And now the phone doesn't rock at all when laying on a flat surface :)
Today was super busy one, working, hosting a meetup and coming home late in the evening. So not much time to use the phone.
Not that I didn't use it - I used it for some meetings, phone calls, messaging, a bit of chess in the morning, emails during the day. A couple of photos and a video. But not much.
It's been detached from a charger for 17.5 hours, and has decharged merely 25% from 85% down to 60%. That's around 70 hours of light runtime on a 100% charge!
As usually I had lots of Teams meetings, first while communiting, then (still from the phone) from the office. Around 1.5 hours in total.
I had a meeting over Signal, heard some podcasts from Spotify and saw some tutorials from youtube.
Not a super busy phone-day, but just some heavy usage of screen and cellular/wireless.
This reflects on the consumption, but still quite good for a small(ish) phone: 35% left on the battery after 18 hours, which is 50% down. Giving a total of 36 hours of on-battery usage on a full charge. Much better than last Friday, but it's difficult to make a 1:1 comparison, since last Friday was my first full day of usage.
Sort of normal Saturday today, normal usage, no meetings, but some streaming (of podcast/radio/music and a bit on youtube).
56% left after 14 hours of usage, 29% down, which equals around 48 hours on a full charge. Better than last Saturday!
Long story short, probably pretty standard for a Sunday. 31% down in 14.5 hours, meaning around 46 hours on a full charge. It was better last Sunday, but I was on cellular all day today, which is probably the cause for the higher battery usage.
I didn't charge it last night. And now it's 24.25 hours later than yesterday. Used it a bit less than normally for Teams, but S bit more fif photos.
38.75 hours, and it's on 15%. That's 70% down, giving 55 hours on a full charge. Not bad at all (actually ver impressive)!
Long story short - it's now on 57% after 17 hours. That's around 60 hours on a full charge.
Day 13: Wednesday (again)
Long story short - didn't charge overnight.
After around 39 hours there's still 29% left. Which means around 69 hours on a full charge.
I haven't used my phone as much as I usually do for the last couple of days. But for 2 nights in a row, I haven't charged it at all. Now 63 hours after pulling the plug to the charger, there's still 7% left on the battery. And remember - it's down from 85%!
That adds up to around 80 hours on a full charge.
If my usage the last days had been normal, it would be a bit less, which also reflects on the battery status, as shown here:
The Galaxy S23 has amazing battery life for it's size! I'm very pleased with the results :)
It can easily last for 2 days (which in reality is just around 16+24 hours) - very nice if you can't find a charger if you need to crash at a friends place, work late hours or similar.
Just remember - before you compare my numbers with your own - that I'm _not_ a teenager looking at my phone and sending snaps every now and then! ;)
I can use my Galaxy S23 at least as long as my previous Galaxy S22 Ultra.
Oh yeah, you may have noticed, that I have the Power Saving feature turned on, on the screenshot above. That was also turned on, on my Galaxy S22 Ultra. This makes the comparison more accurate.
This is the settings of my Power Saving features:
If you have any questions/comments, let me know via Twitter - @luposlip.
NB: Why did I write this?
I thought I'd write this up, because I'd have been really interested in this myself, if I didn't already buy the new phone.
I really liked the cameras from the Galaxy S22 Ultra, and the new S23 Ultra is probably even better. But after many years being a user of "the biggest phone" from the Galaxy lineup, I really wanted something smaller, lighter, more discrete.
I chose the green S23 by the way - it looks awesome. And it's super nice to hold in the hand. I'm happy about the switch, and the smaller form factor is probably a perfect fit for me.
NB: I'm not in any way affiliated with Samsung, I just like their Galaxy phones (I've also had iPhones and Android phones from other vendors). I'd probably have considered an iPhone 14 Mini if it existed.. I really hope the smartphone manufacturers will stop making every generation bigger. The S23 has a perfect size IMO, and with good battery life and a nice camera lineup, there really is no need for bigger sizes. Don't make the next generation bigger!
