The official Nexus 5 thread.

[ponyo]

Thanks for the battery life info. Made it easy for me to scratch this phone from my purchase list.

 

[zerogear]

Thanks for the battery life info. Made it easy for me to scratch this phone from my purchase list.

Really? 4+ hours screen-on time is really good/decent for most phones.

I was getting only about 3.5-4 with S4. (Note 2 is another story)

 

[WelshBloke]

Really? 4+ hours screen-on time is really good/decent for most phones.

I was getting only about 3.5-4 with S4. (Note 2 is another story)

That's an S3 with a 3000mah battery. That's why we wanted a bigger battery in the S5.
Generation or two newer and bigger battery would have given epic battery life.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Dunno if anyone noticed, but the GSM Arena battery test has been completed:

http://blog.gsmarena.com/nexus-5-grinds-through-our-battery-test-routine/

Endurance rating of 40 hours is so-so.

For the record:

GNex: 30 hours
N4: 32 hours
N5: 40 hours
GS2: 40 hours (42 hours for ICS)
GS3: 43 hours (50 hours for JB)
iPhone 4s: 45 hours
HTC One: 48 hours
iPhone 5: 51 hours
iPhone 5s: 54 hours
LG G2: 62 hours
GS4: 63 hours

 

[tvdang7]

Wonder what is taking the AT review so long?

 

[jimv1983]

Dunno if anyone noticed, but the GSM Arena battery test has been completed:

http://blog.gsmarena.com/nexus-5-grinds-through-our-battery-test-routine/

Endurance rating of 40 hours is so-so.

For the record:

GNex: 30 hours
N4: 32 hours
N5: 40 hours
GS2: 40 hours (42 hours for ICS)
GS3: 43 hours (50 hours for JB)
iPhone 4s: 45 hours
HTC One: 48 hours
iPhone 5: 51 hours
iPhone 5s: 54 hours
LG G2: 62 hours
GS4: 63 hours

That just tells me that these tests mean absolutely nothing. According to these numbers the Nexus 5 and Galaxy S2 get about the same battery life and that ICS made battery life better on the S2. Both of things or NOT true. The battery life on my Nexus 5 is WAY better than my GS2 EVER was. The best my S2 ever got was maybe 9 hours off charger with maybe 2.5 hours screen on time. The "ICS update" actually made battery life noticeably worse. My Nexus 5 can get 15-18 hours off charger with 3.5-4 hours screen on time.

This also shows that the S4 gets slightly better than the G2 which is just ridiculous. My cousins S4 doesn't get much better than my S2 did.

 

[dawheat]

That just tells me that these tests mean absolutely nothing. According to these numbers the Nexus 5 and Galaxy S2 get about the same battery life and that ICS made battery life better on the S2. Both of things or NOT true. The battery life on my Nexus 5 is WAY better than my GS2 EVER was. The best my S2 ever got was maybe 9 hours off charger with maybe 2.5 hours screen on time. The "ICS update" actually made battery life noticeably worse. My Nexus 5 can get 15-18 hours off charger with 3.5-4 hours screen on time.

This also shows that the S4 gets slightly better than the G2 which is just ridiculous. My cousins S4 doesn't get much better than my S2 did.

The endurance rating makes no sense to me. In their own tests, the G2 was substantially better in talk time, much much better in web browsing time, and a bit worse in video playback compared to the S4. How does that equate to a slightly higher rating for the S4?

 

[s44]

The endurance rating makes no sense to me. In their own tests, the G2 was substantially better in talk time, much much better in web browsing time, and a bit worse in video playback compared to the S4. How does that equate to a slightly higher rating for the S4?

Idle/sleep. This was the big issue with the One, though I haven't heard the G2 having any such drawback.

 

[leper84]

That just tells me that these tests mean absolutely nothing. According to these numbers the Nexus 5 and Galaxy S2 get about the same battery life and that ICS made battery life better on the S2. Both of things or NOT true. The battery life on my Nexus 5 is WAY better than my GS2 EVER was. The best my S2 ever got was maybe 9 hours off charger with maybe 2.5 hours screen on time. The "ICS update" actually made battery life noticeably worse. My Nexus 5 can get 15-18 hours off charger with 3.5-4 hours screen on time.

This also shows that the S4 gets slightly better than the G2 which is just ridiculous. My cousins S4 doesn't get much better than my S2 did.

I have to +1 this. 4+ hours screen time like people are showing in this thread and my S3 would die halfway through the day. But somehow that test rates it better? Bull.

Related to the entire rest of this thread, I'm not seeing whats so crazy horrible about the battery life. Its a $350 phone. Close to half the price of a S4 and still almost $50 cheaper than a S3- which it absolutely freaking wipes the floor with. If Google had put a 3000mAh battery in they would have had to cut a corner somewhere else. The battery lasts through the day for 99% of people.... would you all prefer a cheaper soc? Less ram? Or how about a 720p display?

 

[tuan209]

Id wait for the Anandtech review.

I havent read the review but read that they did the battery testing by setting the display on all phones to 50%. As we all know, the N5 display at 50% is much brighter than most displays set at 50%.

Dunno if anyone noticed, but the GSM Arena battery test has been completed:

http://blog.gsmarena.com/nexus-5-grinds-through-our-battery-test-routine/

Endurance rating of 40 hours is so-so.

For the record:

GNex: 30 hours
N4: 32 hours
N5: 40 hours
GS2: 40 hours (42 hours for ICS)
GS3: 43 hours (50 hours for JB)
iPhone 4s: 45 hours
HTC One: 48 hours
iPhone 5: 51 hours
iPhone 5s: 54 hours
LG G2: 62 hours
GS4: 63 hours

 

[WelshBloke]

Ba

If Google had put a 3000mAh battery in they would have had to cut a corner somewhere else. The battery lasts through the day for 99% of people.... would you all prefer a cheaper soc? Less ram? Or how about a 720p display?

I very much doubt that a 3000mAh battery would make a significant difference to the final price.

 

[thecapsaicinkid]

Brian Klug in All About Android (Episode 135) states that most people that think the screen is washed out in the Nexus 5 is because they are used to overly saturated screens. He states that OEMs are pushing the saturation above 75%, like in most AMOLED screens, are pushing the saturation to the max in the screen analysis. Google tuned the Nexus 5 panel closer to 'real life' colors rather than oversaturated. He says that it is the same panel as the Droid DNA. Watch it around minute 49.

from one of the comments. self proclaimed display guy on pocketnow is an idiot

This is really worrying. If a large enough percentage of people get acclimatised to highly saturated, very bright displays (how many Galaxy phones are in the wild?) we're in for a future of unnatural displays with ramped backlights. I really think the Nexus 5 backlight being so aggressive is in response to all those complaining the Nexus 4 was very dim.

It's exactly like the TV market, people are drawn to saturation, brightness and very cool whites. The only difference is in mobile you're usually stuck without the settings to fix it

I bet if you stuck a N5 next to a stock Nexus 4 with its backlight ramped, 95% of people would say the 4 looks better due to the much cooler whites and the sharper, unscaled home screen icons.

 

[Tom]

This is really worrying. If a large enough percentage of people get acclimatised to highly saturated, very bright displays (how many Galaxy phones are in the wild?) we're in for a future of unnatural displays with ramped backlights. I really think the Nexus 5 backlight being so aggressive is in response to all those complaining the Nexus 4 was very dim.

It's exactly like the TV market, people are drawn to saturation, brightness and very cool whites. The only difference is in mobile you're usually stuck without the settings to fix it

I bet if you stuck a N5 next to a stock Nexus 4 with its backlight ramped, 95% of people would say the 4 looks better due to the much cooler whites and the sharper, unscaled home screen icons.

If you like natural so much just look away from the screen.

Here's the thing, unless you're looking at something that's smaller than 4 inches in real life, you aren't looking at a "natural" view of it on a phone.

 

[cbrunny]

PSA: Don't put your nexus 5 through the washing machine. It's not that waterproof.

Pretty sure I'm the first one to buy a replacement nexus 5 to replace the one i bought on launch day.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

That just tells me that these tests mean absolutely nothing. According to these numbers the Nexus 5 and Galaxy S2 get about the same battery life and that ICS made battery life better on the S2. Both of things or NOT true. The battery life on my Nexus 5 is WAY better than my GS2 EVER was. The best my S2 ever got was maybe 9 hours off charger with maybe 2.5 hours screen on time. The "ICS update" actually made battery life noticeably worse. My Nexus 5 can get 15-18 hours off charger with 3.5-4 hours screen on time.

This also shows that the S4 gets slightly better than the G2 which is just ridiculous. My cousins S4 doesn't get much better than my S2 did.

Was this on TouchWiz or a custom ROM? I think the Galaxy phones, especially the S2 and S3 Exynos versions tend to perform better on TouchWiz just simply because AOSP back then lacked a lot of features. Furthermore, the Exynos SoCs are difficult to develop for so any AOSP ROM for those phones contain a great amount of hackery.

This is really worrying. If a large enough percentage of people get acclimatised to highly saturated, very bright displays (how many Galaxy phones are in the wild?) we're in for a future of unnatural displays with ramped backlights. I really think the Nexus 5 backlight being so aggressive is in response to all those complaining the Nexus 4 was very dim.

It's exactly like the TV market, people are drawn to saturation, brightness and very cool whites. The only difference is in mobile you're usually stuck without the settings to fix it

I bet if you stuck a N5 next to a stock Nexus 4 with its backlight ramped, 95% of people would say the 4 looks better due to the much cooler whites and the sharper, unscaled home screen icons.

The Nexus 4 was dim, but they compensated by raising the Gamma all over the place so you get an overall bright enough screen for the user to see. That was where the washed out colors came from.

The N5's backlight is far more aggressive. Side by side with my iPhone 5, it's just consistently very bright. As for color calibration, it needs to be done at a fixed brightness. You can't run auto brightness and expect the calibration to stay the same. So the Nexus 5 may be able to display 99% of sRGB as one test noted, but we need to see how accurate it is in general. I'm going to suspect it's good in some aspects, but not all the way there. Compared to my iPhone 5 for example, somethings are washed out, and that may be because of the brightness coming into play.

I have put the 4 and the 5 side by side. I'm not sure how ANYONE will pick the N4 over the N5 based on screen. From day 1, I've been saying the colors are crap, while most people here and on XDA were like "omg such a wonderful screen," likely due to being more attracted to 720p than good colors?

With that said, what you are describing for people liking oversaturated colors is already huge in the laptop market. There's a reason almost all screens are now glossy and even though many of those screen use TN panels, manufacturers are trying to give deep colors which make people think that it's wonderful. As someone who used to do a lot of photo editing on my MacBook, I'm quite disappointed there's no solution out there for a photo editor. I think I'll have to stick to my desktop for that.

 

[lopri]

My Nexus 5 survived a 2 day business trip. Lots of phone calls and some photo-taking.

Things that I auto-sync: Email, Contacts, Calendar, Music

Everything else is synced manually. GPS/Location service off. (I turn it on when needed) Wi-Fi off during sleep except when charging. RSS feeds are manually pulled when I have time to read. Main browser = Opera. I don't do social media. Brightness is manually set at somewhere between 15~20%.

Quite a few things (e.g. Google+) are freezed and/or blocked by firewall. Also thank goodness for Adaway. I thought I would give a try at stock without root but I totally forgot about how many ads I were to deal with. So I had no choice but to.

Noticeably better than the Nexus 4 under this kind of usage scenario. (~ +50%?)

 

[lopri]

This also shows that the S4 gets slightly better than the G2 which is just ridiculous.

That sounds really far off.

I wonder how reviews test batteries. Like, when they do video runs, do they take the SIM out and put the phone under airplane mode while running videos?

 

[lopri]

I don't think I'm going to get my battery life better than this on stock.

Root, man. Root. :awe:

Still, ~ 5 hrs. is WAY better than average performance I have seen @XDA. Most folks there seem to get 3~4 hrs. of screen time.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

That sounds really far off.

I wonder how reviews test batteries. Like, when they do video runs, do they take the SIM out and put the phone under airplane mode while running videos?

Video is tested under airplane mode. The thing about the G2 that people have been shown is how well it does in active use such as wifi rundown, etc. on Anandtech. GSM Arena tests for idle which no other site does. Granted they don't detail too much information on it, so I wouldn't say it's the golden test. But it's interesting to note at least. Perhaps the S4 does better than the G2 in idle? We really don't have any information on that.

 

[FwFred]

PSA: Don't put your nexus 5 through the washing machine. It's not that waterproof.

Pretty sure I'm the first one to buy a replacement nexus 5 to replace the one i bought on launch day.

My wife broke hers yesterday. Did she beat you?

She dropped hers on the screen. Screen assembly from eBay is $230. Contacting LG, we'll see what they say for repair costs. Hopefully Discover Card comes through with their accidental damage protection..

 

[soccerballtux]

I've had mine since the 5th, a little over a week now. I've not seen any difference in my battery life. Naturally the first couple days I was playing with it a lot more than I have since. So maybe that is the reason it seems worse at first?

The battery life seems very much like my Nexus 4. Nothing great, but it gets me through a day.

Other recommendation folks, charge on USB 500ma.
Slower charge lets the cell absorb more before finishing.
Alternatively the hardware in the circuit can trickle charge until 0.02C, sometimes they stop at 0.05C.
Similar-- Musks' Tesla Model S supercharging stations only give a 50% rapid charge boost. The Cells still read 4.2v when finished charging, but they're not as deeply charged.

Forgive my handwaving. I'm bad with technical descriptions. But the science is there and I definitely get a good 10% better battery life out of my phones by charging on USB 500mA instead.

 

[soccerballtux]

I don't think I'm going to get my battery life better than this on stock.

You see Chrome taking all that battery?

Switch to Firefox.
Should drop that by at least half maybe 2/3rds.
Made a decent diff to my battery life.

 

[tsupersonic]

I'm impressed with the battery life. It's better than the HTC One (Sense w/ power savings mode). Getting about 2 days with about 1.5-2 hours of on-screen time

 

[soccerballtux]

Oh, thank you. I will keep a lookout.

My opinion (forming) on the N5 is nearing its final stage and I am not certain how much of an upgrade this is from the N4. Some would argue LTE in and of itself is worthy of upgrade and I cannot disagree with it. But if one can get by without LTE for now, the difference between the N4 and the N5 is at once large yet very small from another angle.

the modem doesn't have the wakelock problems which should help battery a lot

 

[lopri]

Other recommendation folks, charge on USB 500ma.
Slower charge lets the cell absorb more before finishing.
Alternatively the hardware in the circuit can trickle charge until 0.02C, sometimes they stop at 0.05C.

Is that true, and if so, how big of a deal is it? I guess I am OK now that I've gotten myself a wireless charger for my night stand, but when needed I like to charge my N5 using Samsung's 2A charger. It takes about an hour to charge my Nexus 5 90%+ using that thing. (Didn't Qualcomm advertise "QuickCharge" as a new tech of theirs?)