r/apple • u/Sumit316 • Feb 01 '21

What Apple Watch really needs is a battery that lasts longer than a day Apple Watch

https://www.cnet.com/news/what-apple-watch-really-needs-is-a-battery-that-lasts-longer-than-a-day/
17.8k Upvotes

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1.6k

u/Shame_Actual Feb 01 '21

I’m a little biased with battery life because i feel like it should be an ever expanding thing. much like the tech itself

670

u/rdldr1 Feb 01 '21

battery... an ever expanding thing

Wording! #spicypillow

180

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

[deleted]

98

u/gardat Feb 01 '21

Samsung did it first

25

u/AssignedWork Feb 01 '21

I don't know about that.... my Movado has a 10 year battery :)

2

u/ClathrateRemonte Feb 02 '21

You got lucky there.

1

u/Environmental_Set_68 Feb 02 '21

No it doesn’t. Theres no such thing as a 10 year battery. Its simply a battery much the same as a double aa battery is a double aa but some qualities of battery are better than others. Energizer watch batteries are regarded as the best. Quartz watch battery lifes are like fuel mileage on a car. Some are more efficent with the power based on the movement within the watch, which acts as the heart and brains.

1

u/AssignedWork Feb 12 '21

My bad. Three years. Lot longer than a day.

4

u/Sivalon Feb 01 '21

And hotter, too.

2

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

I'm sure that Apple can rise to the occasion!

33

u/threeme2189 Feb 01 '21

Didn't the Galaxy Note 7 come with that feature?

17

u/TimTheEnchanter623 Feb 02 '21

That’s swell...but not in a good way!

3

u/DR_BIG_GING Feb 02 '21

r/spicypillows is an actual Sub I’m pretty sure.

2

u/Ichigouzumaki100 Feb 02 '21

Or Battery as in assault

2

u/Bogey_Kingston Feb 02 '21

I think you meant phrasing but this is funnier

2

u/PressureWelder Feb 02 '21

are we talking expanding like the note 7 did or expanding capacity

-1

u/Tree_____Guy Feb 01 '21

r/spicypillow

1

u/sub_doesnt_exist_bot Feb 01 '21

The subreddit r/spicypillow does not exist. Consider creating it.

🤖 this comment was written by a bot. beep boop 🤖

feel welcome to respond 'Bad bot'/'Good bot', it's useful feedback. github

214

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

47

u/Shame_Actual Feb 01 '21

Ah yes i cannot wait until we get 70’s sized phones that have the battery-life to outlive me

-1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

Our phones are already bigger than the 70s ones minus thickness. We used to have phones 1/4 the height and width of today's phones, and we keep getting them bigger.

3

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

Seriously? They were the size of two bricks glued together in the 70’es.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

0

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

1973 was the first one

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

0

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Feb 02 '21

Yes 1973. That is when they became a more public thing my grandpa had one many people had one because that was the phone that a lot of kids grew up having to play with. In the '90s is just when it became something that most people started having.

Edit: you're wrong about the 40s I forgot to add as well

The first cell phone was invented in 1973 by Motorola. On April 3, 1973, Motorola engineer Martin Cooper made the first-ever cell phone call on the DynaTAC 8000X. The prototype he used weighed 2.4 lb (1.1 kg) and measured 9.1 x 5.1 x 1.8 in (23 x 13 x 4.5 cm).Aug 4, 2020

1

u/KurageSama Feb 02 '21

Didn’t Duracell make a thick smart phone?

1

u/qtrain23 Feb 02 '21

Energizer but yes. 16k mah

2

u/mordacthedenier Feb 02 '21

16 thousand thousandths.

2

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

2

u/mordacthedenier Feb 02 '21

Yep. I can't wait for some future point when some new battery chemistry is used and people argue about how phone x with 23 thousand thousandths of an amp hour is actually better than phone y with 28 thousand thousandths because the voltage is higher.

28

u/Monkey_Fiddler Feb 01 '21

another way is to reduce capabilities. really depends what you want the watch for

6

u/bizzaro321 Feb 02 '21

You could also lower the performance

0

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

[removed] — view removed comment

0

u/bizzaro321 Feb 02 '21

I didn’t say “replace it with lower performance parts”, I said, “lower the performance”. This can happen at the software level.

My comment is also a joke, it is a response to someone who repeated something from the parent comment in this thread.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

Or slap a epaper screen on it. I dont want to watch movies on my watch. I want to get the time and some extra smart options for everyday convinience

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

Then the apple watch is not for you. E reader screens are shit. Color makes the watch so much more vibrant. Why do you think pebble died?

1

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

I keep certain settings off depending on what I’m doing and it definitely does help.

6

u/knightblue4 Feb 02 '21

I would love a larger battery. Phones are far too thin nowadays.

2

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

0

u/knightblue4 Feb 02 '21

I honestly really miss the iPhone 4 form factor :'( Perfect thickness and heft for my hands.

2

u/Eleventeen- Feb 02 '21

iPhone SE and a semi bulky case?

2

u/eloc49 Feb 01 '21

3 you probably don't want.

Those of us that do, never get a choice though.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

1

u/eloc49 Feb 02 '21

Anyone have sales data of battery cases?

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

1

u/eloc49 Feb 02 '21

I'm referring to the scope of all tech, like the parent comment implies, not just the Apple Watch.

2

u/GalaxyZeroOne Feb 02 '21

My garmin lasts like 5 days at least. Now that is just in watch/heart rate mode with Bluetooth notifications. It only lasts like 8 hours if it is doing the gps exercise tracking

2

u/nasdurden Feb 02 '21

Apple really doesn’t do enough to take advantage of their efficiency though. The iPhone Pro Max would last 3-4 days for most people if they packed a 5000mAh battery into it like Samsung has done with the S21 Ultra.

1

u/sniper1rfa Feb 01 '21
  1. Less features.

Features are the #1 driver of battery life.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

3

u/sniper1rfa Feb 01 '21 edited Feb 01 '21

You can disable the screen resolution? Or whatever baked in design spec you choose?

If the MCU is spec'd for feature set A, then it will draw more power during wake than an mcu spec'd for reduced feature set B.

I'm talking about engineering, not your user preferences.

The point is, if you continue to demand more features then the improved batteries will be used for more features, not better battery life. That's why you can still have a slow, unresponsive computer today, even though they're a thousand times faster than computers from 20 years ago.

EDIT: I mean, don't listen to me I guess? I'm literally the guy who spec's batteries on the projects I work on. Like, actually my job is figuring out the power budget.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21 edited Apr 05 '21

[deleted]

2

u/sniper1rfa Feb 01 '21

No. Efficiency is performing a task using less energy. Using less energy because you're doing fewer tasks is... just doing fewer tasks.

Improving efficiency is really hard. Doing less stuff is easy.

4

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21 edited Apr 05 '21

[deleted]

1

u/sniper1rfa Feb 02 '21

"Eliminating a feature" is a very strange and unusual definition of "improving efficiency." I wouldn't recommend bringing that out in a technical discussion because you'll confuse the crap out of everybody.

0

u/yorcharturoqro Feb 01 '21

Apple is not the best in 1 in all fronts, I'll say it is in laptops, but that is it, the performance of the iphone compared to many other phones is lackluster.

The iPad has a good battery life because of 3, not 1.

Apple is slow to implement 1, currently they are better, but considering that the iphone battery life has been an issue since day one, it took them 11 generations of phones to achieve decent battery, not the best battery.

Chinese brands like Huawei and , Xiaomi have impressive battery life. Huawei it's quite heavy in the 1, closing and controlling more the apps than other phones.

1

u/Sex4Vespene Feb 02 '21

You are being completely ignorant to the physical size of the battery. The IPhone batteries are so much smaller, it is almost unbelievable for long they work. If you put the same battery in one of those other phones, they would die so much quicker.

1

u/RichestMangInBabylon Feb 01 '21

Isn't there a 3b in terms of making batteries physically fit better? It's technically just making them physically larger, but in spaces they couldn't fit before? For example if there was such a thing as a flexible battery couldn't the watch band itself become a battery?

1

u/SelloutRealBig Feb 02 '21
  1. weaker specs and screen and a less bloated os. There is a reason a tamogachi still works after 10 years on the same battery.

1

u/PM_ME_AZN_BOOBS Feb 02 '21

I wouldn't mind Garmin level screen with 7 day battery life + Apple Watch functionality personally.

0

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21 edited Apr 11 '21

[deleted]

1

u/100catactivs Feb 02 '21

+Apple Watch functionality

-1

u/LongIslandFinanceGuy Feb 01 '21

If it was 50 percent larger and maybe a larger screen it would be nice if it could go a day and a half

0

u/BashfulWitness Feb 02 '21

3> I want an apple watch that was essentially the size of of the existing (larger model) screens side-by-side.

-4

u/CoolAppz Feb 01 '21

A patent and a rumor surfaced saying Apple has a new kind of battery to launch in 2024 with the car. Apparently they have invented something and must be better regarding 1 or 2, or both.

1

u/laguiar-br Feb 01 '21
  1. Apple Watch Pro Max

1

u/DisastrousCost9 Feb 02 '21

You forgot 4. Newer charging technology. Something like charge via motion while wearing or contactless or tap or fast charging covers/pods/straps.

1

u/bitflung Feb 02 '21

  1. reduced functionality (you might not like it, but it's a path to efficiency)

  2. alternative/hybrid power sources (solar, thermal, kinetic).

the watch i wear daily uses 1, 4, and 5. extremely power efficient, lower functionality (e.g. uses a memory LCD display that normally updates once a minute), and has both solar and thermal power sources alongside the normal battery.

lasts 3-4 months between charging events. firmware improvements keep increasing that period too, with a goal for never having to take it in off to charge, ever. they likely won't hit that goal, especially not if you ise the gps much to track runs/etc, but still 3-4 months is huge compared to 1-2 days.

1

u/zold5 Feb 02 '21

What about option 3 but make the other components in the phone smaller?

1

u/[deleted] Feb 03 '21

If they could find some way to put a reserve battery in the band, I’m sure people would buy it

1

u/sinistrile_red Feb 13 '21

Samsung watches lasts 2 weeks without a charge

385

u/LePontif11 Feb 01 '21

I feel the same way about my bank account but some things are limited by more than what people feel, ya feel me.

69

u/CaptainJackM Feb 01 '21

Ya I’d love for an engineer to laugh in their face and say “ya that would be great for it to be an ‘eVeR ExPaNdInG tHiNg’ but that’s just how how the science/tech works. Welcome to reality.”

People need to learn what they’re talking about before forming what the “believe”.

35

u/Shame_Actual Feb 01 '21 edited Feb 01 '21

hehe lithium go brr /s

-1

u/8-out-of-10 Feb 01 '21

Why can't the watch just. Do less things? Old watches last months if not years. No one wants a watch with a processor

0

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

smart watches are dumb as hell

-6

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Dunning Kruger effect. When you assume you understand a subject or concept because you know so little you’re actually unaware of how much more there is to know.

15

u/Psychological_Salad_ Feb 01 '21

It’s not that deep, he was just wrong.

-1

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

It’s not a deep concept & it’s about being wrong lol

0

u/OutlawHKD Feb 01 '21

Fuck yeah. I used to work for Apple support as a senior advisor. I hated dealing with ignorant opinionated people all day.

22

u/Martin_Samuelson Feb 01 '21

Batteries have been steadily improving. What actually happens is that battery improvements are 'consumed' by the tech.

Which is what the consumers demand.

1

u/astalavista114 Feb 02 '21

It’s like web pages. Internet speeds have gotten faster, but page load times are, at best, barely faster than they were in the dial-up years.

6

u/mordacthedenier Feb 02 '21

While I agree most web pages are bloated beyond reason, they're nowhere near "watch the text load paragraph by paragraph" slow or "the 3 images on the entire page do that thing where they load in black and white first" slow.

3

u/ItsTyrrellsAlt Feb 02 '21

idk man web pages load essentially instantly for me now, compared to having to watch text and images scroll open when I first started using the internet

2

u/FiftyBurger Feb 02 '21

I think they are wrong on the dial up part but right on the rest. Shit hasn’t sped up in my opinion in a long time. I feel no difference in my 3g compared to lte too often

21

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

I have a Seiko kinetic watch I love that never needs a battery change since motion powers the device.

GPS watches seem cool but having yet another device to charge and keep track of just isn't what I need. I don't even know if I want a tablet at this rate. I hate batteries ruling our life lol

20

u/toastmannn Feb 01 '21

Get a Garmin.

6

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Instinct gang. Charge every two weeks

1

u/Iggy404 Feb 02 '21

Instinct Solar! Charge every 4 weeks and even less often with a lot of sunshine =D

1

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Own the Venu. It's real nice.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

My Venu is wonderful! Wish I could afford a Fenix

3

u/simonch1 Feb 01 '21

I have a Fenix 5x which is arguably old tech now. I love it. One of those things I’m happy with and don’t feel the need to upgrade. Stick in dude - you’ll get one one day!

1

u/PLZBHVR Feb 01 '21

Does Garmin has access to Apple/Samsung/whatever payment apps? That's the main thing is use my watch for (got it for a gift from work for working through covid - don't own an iPhone so my usage is quite limited anyways). If the Garmin can show me the weather, compass and GPS, it's all I want for outings.

1

u/toastmannn Feb 02 '21

I have a Fenix 6 pro and a instinct, the fenix has Garmin pay, they both have weather (needs a phone connection to update) magnetic compass, and full GPS

1

u/PLZBHVR Feb 02 '21

WiFi works I assume? (With Freedom Mobile so the moment I leave the city I lose data) and that's the main place I want GOS and such.

Do you know of any ones that use satellite GPS? I'm planning some big bike trips this summer and wouldn't mind that biking across provinces.

1

u/toastmannn Feb 02 '21

Once you lose cell service the watch is completely on its own. The app/phone connection does literally nothing without a active internet connection, but you can load preload maps and music and courses and those all work just fine. Wifi isn't going to help you much in this case. If you want weather without cell service look into Inreach, many of the watches have integration.

1

u/PLZBHVR Feb 02 '21

As long as it can show me my GPS location it's fine, mainly just want to have the information available so I can decide if I should camp out for the night or push to the next town. I originally planned this trip last summer without the watch in mind, so I don't really need it but it really wouldn't hurt. Plus with winter coming to an end Im finding it hard to justify putting more money into the PC than outdoor stuff.

1

u/toastmannn Feb 02 '21

Is that's all your doing it's probably easier and cheaper just to use your smartphone. Google maps does offline maps.

1

u/PLZBHVR Feb 02 '21

Yeah that was the original plan, download a bunch of offline maps and climbing topos before leaving and a normal map for backup.

5

u/CoolAppz Feb 01 '21

I have one of these but the watch weights 400 pounds.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

ohh myyy.

What a BIG ... watch you have

;)

2

u/CoolAppz Feb 01 '21

I do arms at the gym.

-2

u/day7seven Feb 01 '21

If you are not a fan of having an extra device, you can get rid of your watch. You already have phone that tells time so your watch is just a redundant device. Having a watch in 2021 is as redundant as having a pocket calculator, camera, compass, and mp3 player in your pocket.

5

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

You must think that having a physical book is a waste of space when you have a kindle 😐

2

u/tupacsnoducket Feb 01 '21

It’s a multi feature health stats tracker, and app extension, being a watch is just the most surface level entry point for the user.

I literally don’t use it for time,

4

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

The least important feature of my smart watch is its ability to tell time.

-1

u/day7seven Feb 01 '21

The person I am replying to has a dumb watch though.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Watches are fashion to people

1

u/yorcharturoqro Feb 01 '21

Like in the phones, like 5% of the usage I do is phone calls, the rest is different.

1

u/argothewise Feb 02 '21

People think I bought an automatic watch to tell the time. It’s actually near the bottom of reasons why I like mechanical time pieces

-2

u/teddygala12 Feb 01 '21

Get a real watch hahaha

1

u/[deleted] Feb 23 '21

I have a nice kinetic but wanted a fitness watch. Got a FitBit that has a 10 day battery.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 23 '21

I just saw this thing oura ring that looks pretty cool. More for sleep/heart than fitness I think but a ring is a great idea

1

u/[deleted] Feb 23 '21

yes, pretty neat tech.

7

u/GhostalMedia Feb 01 '21

Given Apple’s track record, they’ll probably shoot to keep watch battery life around what it has been for the past couple years.

Apple often offsets small efficiency gains with the introduction of new features that require more power.

1

u/wellriddleme-this Feb 01 '21

My garmin watch battery lasts for two weeks. If they can do it, so can apple.

1

u/Shaman19911 Feb 01 '21

This is why slavery still exists in countries that mine for these minerals. People clamor for the most cutting edge tech and drop last year's model in a flash. Nice that these people have the disposable income to upgrade their useless gadgets every year or two, but I hope they realize it is far from necessary.

-1

u/Kackboy Feb 01 '21

What...?

-1

u/Vortex112 Feb 01 '21

Battery tech has not improved for years. Everyone’s waiting for breakthroughs with graphene

-1

u/MrAndycrank Feb 01 '21

Lithium batteries already reached their full potential. Until graphene becomes a thing (I hope soon enough, even though every years the revolution gets postponed), we'll, at most, get faster devices with the same battery life. I can't see how current batteries could be improved: they're totally unfit for modern devices.

0

u/CoolAppz Feb 01 '21

The tech we use is what, 30 years old? Batteries are 220 years old. First cars were electric, not combustion engines and were massacred by combustion engine cars because nobody managed to make batteries have an acceptable level of density energy at the same low price as gasoline. I feel your pain. I want electric cars desperately, but batteries have to evolve fast.

0

u/[deleted] Feb 01 '21

Lithium batteries are very limited. Once solid state batteries trickle down to consumer goods like this worrying about batteries will be a thing of the past. Give it a decade, given Toyota have working prototypes of solid state battery EVs and are targeting 2025 for mass production. And Daimler already have solid state battery EV buses you can just go and buy.

0

u/pottertown Feb 01 '21

Why?

What scenario makes a watch more usable if it has 1.5 vs, say, 4 days of battery?

You're going to either be:

A) Charging it every day/night

B) At some point realizing it has less charge than you need for the day and you either drop it on a charger or into low power mode

​

If you're not charging every night/day it's always going to be some sort of a hassle whether it's got a 1.5 day or a 20 day battery.

0

u/PLZBHVR Feb 01 '21

Graphene cells are becoming a thing at a reasonable price. This is the first major battery tech we have seen in decades, so hopefully they can find a good use for them as they become available (afaik they are phenomenal for power output, which the watch doesn't need so idk if it will help lengevity)

0

u/racerG Feb 02 '21

note7 gang💯💯

-1

u/BoredDirt Feb 01 '21

Funny you say that because there’s a huge chance battery capacity will be shrinking in the next couple of decades due to wireless energy hubs charging ur phone without having it plugged in

1

u/MrInternetToughGuy Feb 01 '21

Sure. Right up until physics is your barrier lol

1

u/btapia2435 Feb 01 '21

I just want T-9 texting

1

u/SixPackAndNothinToDo Feb 01 '21

I don't understand what your bias is here?
Holding a particular opinion does not make you biased.

1

u/AltoExyl Feb 01 '21

The battery in my S0 definitely was ever expanding...

1

u/bitflung Feb 02 '21

you'd like the intent behind the watch i wear them (though not everyone is as happy with it as i am): PowerWatch2. i charge once every 3-4 months, and it's not even dead yet when i do.

1

u/greatspacegibbon Feb 02 '21

The problem is there performance we expect rises at about the same rate as the battery life. If you were happy with ten year old performance, today's chip efficiently and battery life would last for a week.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

At least with laptops, I saw on a tech video that many tech companies are limited on Mah battery size for laptops, because of airline limits. Kind of like the galaxy note fiasco where they’d inflate mid flight. They advertise bigger and better batteries but are overall limited in what they can expand upon.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 02 '21

It is ever expanding, you just don't see it because technology expands right along with it. More powerful means more battery to run the same time.

1

u/semperverus Feb 02 '21

Everyone always makes this assumption without realizing that metric fucktons of money are being poured into battery R&D on a daily basis. If we could have had better batteries by now, we would. Energy density is not the same as transistor count. It can't follow Moore's Law like a cpu/gpu can.