Nokia N900 Battery Test Results
It seems that the majority of posts here at Mobile-Users recently seem to do with the N900. (I certainly apologise – the handset is keeping me very busy recently!)
One thing I’ve found is that the battery life on the phone seems to drain too quickly… My average over the week is approximately 6-10 hours with Wi-Fi/3G connected 24/7, MSN & Ovi signed in, some music play & calls / texts.
The N900 battery (BL-5J: 1320mAh – same as 5800 Xpress-Music) is officially quoted as offering:
- 2-4 days standby
- Up to 5 hours (3G/WCDMA) / 9 hours (2G/GSM)
- 1 day Active Online Usage
Now, as soon as I got my N900, the battery performance was reminiscent of the Blackberry Bold… nowhere near advertised so the team got hold of a second N900 (aside from my personal one) and performed a series of battery tests over a few days.
Here’s the results:
Test 1:
Test one was the standby time with no connectivity, calls/texts or doing anything with the phone. (i.e. bluetooth, Wi-Fi & Data were all turned off).
Official: 2-4 days
Our Result: 29 hours
Test 2:
Test 2 was continuous music playback with no other connectivity.
Official: 29 hours
Our Result: 13 hours
Test 3:
Active Online usage: connected to Wi-Fi/3G/2G with IM conversations etc happening.
Official: 24 hours
Our Result: 9 hours
Test 4:
Day – to – day usage. This test was performed by me and is based upon averages over 1 week. There is no official time for this so I’ll list my findings anyways.
Our Result: 9 hours on a full charge with Wi-Fi/3G connected, IM conversations open & several short calls & texts.
The point of these tests? To judge exactly how well a 1320mAh battery from the 5800 Xpress Music does in handling the powerhouse that is the Nokia N900.
To be honest, it doesn’t do that great a job. Most people have found battery life is disappointing and all us N900 users can only hope that the next firmware update brings some power saving options & improves battery life!
You might like:
- Nokia N900: What UK Networks will get it?
- N900 Exclusivity Update
- Nokia N900: Background Issue Solved
- Nokia N900 – Retail staff impressions and delays
- Nokia N900: Possible Solution for Mic Problem
Category: Opinion
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Sites That Link to this Post
- Mobile Users » N900 Battery Tests Part 2 | December 14, 2009
- 9 things to do before buying N900! | My 15 days with Nokia N900 | July 7, 2010
“Test 1 – Our Result: 29 hours”
How is that possible? After 24h of almost no usage, I still had almost full battery (1 bar drop only)
That’s not my case. I have some trouble with the battery life too. I want the device to at least work through a *day* and I can’t seem to get that :S
If I start using the phone at 8am at around 5pm I will have to recharge (and all this without heavy usage, just a couple of 5 minutes calls and a bit of email checking. This is totally *UNACCEPTABLE* for a 600€ device.
I get 2-3 days on standby. 29 hours is very low. I think there is an issue with certain desktop gadgets like facebook’s which are a cpu hog.
Hi,
I have to agree with tomaszf, last week I charged my phone on the Saturday early morning and didn’t need to charge it again before Monday late afternoon. It was set on 2G only, I event did some Skype over wifi for at least 30/45mn
I heard that the Foreca weather widget was eating up the battery really quickly
Ok I think real issue is with signal strength as I’m not even getting 9 hours.
With bad/low 3g signal the n900 eats up the battery maybe twice as fast.
I hope this can be optimized in the next firmware. Nevertheless, for what it offers I’m still happy with my N900. Just considering getting an alternate power source with at least 4000mAh so that I can really go crazy and use the device to its full potential.
I agree with with the comment above. I’m getting a lot less than 9 hours per charge. I work an 8 hours shift. I leave home with a full charge. I live 5 mins walk from my work. I’d check my phone an hour or two later, a quarter of its charge has already been gone without me even using it. And there have been times when the phone would get very warm just by being in my pocket. And when it is warm, it tends to accelarate the discharging rate of the battery. I’m hoping firmware update would cure this or just make a bigger capacity battery for it.
Use a stock phone, with no extras installed.
Installing telepathy-MSN or Pidgin is a battery killer, so are many widgets.
@RuEL
This happened to me once. Might be something to do with GPS which I turned off. It hasn’t happened since.
Also I’ve had my phone for about 3 weeks now and it seems to be able to hold a charge better.
Hi,
I got my N900 last week.
Its a GREAT PHONE but also with GREAT LACK in battery life
I had it fully filled up at 7.00 AM and now its 1.13 PM and just 1 bar left.
I think it will not reach 8H of ‘standby’ time…
I almost did not touch the phone…
It has WIFI and 3G enabled constantly with MSN/SKYPE/SIP logged in at all times, but only made 2 calls of 1 minute each and had no conversations….
I also disabled blue-tooth completely as I don’t use it.
As you explain yourself: YOU are not in STANDBY mode. You have Wifi enabled ! + MSN + SKYPE which both ACTIVELY exchange information with the net over Wifi connection. This means you are contantly causing electric load which in not perfect circumstances is even higher than 3G phone call. Not to mention that 3G eats much more battery than normal 2G network (proven). This is even a feat that the device lasted so long……bloetooth does mater only a little as todays bloetooth has been engineered to consume miniscule amount of energy when not transferring data.
I get roughly 6-7 day standby with Nokia 5230 (1320 mAh). I do have 1-2 short calls a day + 1-2 times going online for manual e-mail cheking when i really need it (no automatic checking). I use 2G instead of 3.5G (no wifi on this phone) as in email chekcing the speed difference is non-exsistant. Bloetooth is used only when occasionally uploading some mp3 to phone = off most of the time (i dont see why you need it on between the uses ? anyone ?). Obviously N900 has linux and you never know whats thicking behind the scene even when you switch the features mentioned off.
hi guys i am facing battery issues for N900. after every 4 hours it went down, then i have changed the battery now after every 8 hours it went down. Is it a bug/software problem or something else.
because even my handset is on standby it went down after exactly 8 hours.
please help me to understand the problem
Hi there,
It could potentially be a software bug as I remember having a similar issue when I had my N900.
Try this:
Delete all but 1 homescreens.
Turn screen brightness down
Use Wi-Fi / Bluetooth ONLY when needed.
See if those help the battery life, åre you using the latest software?
Mobile Users
maybe you guys are experiencing this here:
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=36438
What a joke. So I’m supposed to fork out a lot of money for the N900,only to be told that I can’t use bluetooth or some other features because doing so knackers the battery?
No.Instead I say to Nokia ,sort that serious problem out before bringing a phone to market. WTF is that all about.Spending a fortuine on a high tech phone that you can’t use for more than 5 minutes. Stuff that.They’re having a laugh.
i have the same battery issue !
It completely sks, for an internet tablet with such a poor batt life !
so Nokia ppl wants us to keep our wifi/bt/widgets/gps bla bla OFF to get a bttr batt life ? CRAP !
waiting for a soln !
the N900 was advertised to give a full days use…to get 9 hours of online use and all services working is great, for someone that wants 23-24 hours of continuous use is just nuts since there is no phone out there that can give that much use out of a 1320mA battery. I love my N900 and I can get a total of 13-14 hours use with moderate phone, Im and email use as well as internet, music and camera, for the most part it does the work and though it was promised to give 24 hours of use…i am happy with a total of 14 hours.
nokia its a pice of shit…i pay 600usd for a phone that battery last 5h ..
i will never ever by nokia in my life..they are ripping people off
shameeee to nokia
Test 2 says continuous music playback.
Is that music playback on the phones speaker? Or muted sound but music playback?
Or maybe even the phones headphones were connected?
Can somebody please answer on this email address: farhad_uddin@hotmail.co.uk
Thanks.
For what it’s worth. My Nokia e71 munches through the battery if I am logged into Slick IM or if I try to keep a SIP registration. Otherwise with normal 3G “email” usage I can get about two days from a charge. If I turn off all data I can get two to three days out of a charge depending on signal strength.
I’m getting similar results. It’s pretty sad. I really hope firmware updates solve this problem. Hopefully!
We care about battery, should be 3000mAH . or 4000mah. can standby 15days to 30days.
my battery life is less than 8hours with occasional calls and 3g connections using battery meter shows more than 50% drop over 5hours. seriously needs some better power saving to be really productive tool without carrying a spare battery
GPS is a killer. Turn all GPS features off if you want to save battery.
With GPS off, 2G only mode, Bluetooth off, disconnect Internet if not needed (esp WiFi, but GPRS too), no long-running apps and widgets, my N900 can last a whole day.
Granted, now THAT’s ironic!
Completely agree with Robert Barring and Zeppert. To use N900 acceptably you have to disable most of its features. Turn on a feature here and there and it’s dead before noon.
my battery life is draining like crazy with no apps running at all. i bought this phone march 2010. my phone is in mint condition, no scratches, and has not been dropped. i even purchased a new battery and the battery still drains quickly. it dies within 2-3 hours.
I have the same problem, I think it is software error draining the battery fast did u have a solution for this?
i’m really disappointed despite my preference for nokia phones any day any time,i recently ugraded from nokia n95 to n900 and i’m really disappointed cos even my old n95 (still working with my second sim) has far far a battery life than the n900.So my advice to nokia is that they should produce a higher capacity battery for n900 at least i dont mind paying for it instead of running back to chargers all the time.
I bought the nokia n900 and i have been struggling with the battery all because i have to charge it everyday even though i don’t stay on line most of the time. Please nokia do something about the power.
I love my N900. everything is awesome. but the battery life is giving me headache.
97percent to 0percent in less then 3hours of surfing net with 3g connection.
if only it can last at least 8 hr of surfing net, it will be perfect.
hope nokia or battery manufacturer can come out with new and long lasting battery for N900
its a shame that nokia has not been able to come up with
good batteries for it high end N series phone. I face battery
problem with even N82 but N900 is pathetic. It was made without any
plan for battery power for it. N900 makers thought people would use
it plugged to charger all the time. I have been using N900 for 5
months and i can give you the details. you can use it in anyway you
like once fully charged, you will get just 5 hrs of battery life.
This means if you fully charged it over night and use it for call
and internet your battery will drain in just 5 hrs. If you don’t
use it at all then it will drain in 12 to 15 hrs. So all the report
we been receiving about the battery life of Nokia N900 is false. If
you enjoy uploading your mobile pics on facebook or flickr or
picasa over your gprs connection your battery gonna drain in 1hr if
you not kept it plugged. It has happened with me thrice. I was not
even able to upload even 50mb. I can’t say about wifi and 3G. But
its really shameful that Nokia don’t have any answer for this.
Nokia wants its user to switch over to some other mobile to stay
connected.
what should i have to turn it off and how cause now i can use it only one day
i have only one account facebook and turn on some time by 2g
and is it normal if just leave it in stand by mode and battery still gone ?