yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
AOD off, Black theme, Single sim usage.. Three measures I'm seeing right there.

In addition, Android System background activity off (right?). Auto brightness off too?? How about Bixby? Gallery sync? Keeping either mobile data OR WiFi on at a time? How about clouds syncing? Not seeing any social media usage like FB or insta ?
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Galaxo60:
AOD off because I don't use it. Black theme because I like it and got used to it from Huawei devices; still, this won't make any difference because applications are not affected by the theme and most of them have normal color theme. Single SIM because is my only line.

Android System background activity off because this options does nothing and it only drains battery.

Brightness is on auto the whole time, all my Google apps are syncing the whole time, including Calendar, Gmail, Chrome, Photos, Drive, G+ and Keep. As I said, WiFi, Bluetooth and GPS are enabled all the time, no matter where I am, I never disable/enable the toggles. I don't have Facebook or Instagram, but even if I would do, I would use the web version, because everybody knows that those are poorly optimized. I don't use Bixby, but I use Google Assistant along with Google Now, and for this you need to have all the settings enabled the whole time.

;)
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
"Wonderful". :laugh:
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
AOD can drain battery life by quite a bit extra over 48 hours - probably at least 20-30% extra assuming SOT of 6 hours, which means you won't actually achieve being on battery for 48 hours and/or a SOT of 6 hours. Personally, I don't need to be on battery for over 12-15 hours, since I tend to almost always charge overnight. Of course, if I've had a "light usage" day (where I'm still over 80-90% after 10 hours or so), then I wouldn't feel the need to charge overnight.

By the way, have you noticed much benefit from disabling Android System background activity? Like how much less battery drain does it achieve? And any problems or slow-downs by having it disabled?

I actually have very few tweaks personally and still get very good battery life. And to be fair, Samsung has many more features by default than say Pixel 2 XL - many of these features probably drain extra battery too (eg. Bixby).
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Galaxo60:
Honestly, I didn't find so useful AOD for myself, because I'm used to just unlock my device if I need to see something; besides this, we have a nice and big LED and pretty much I would know with it if any notification arrived.

I also have a light usage most of the time, but sometimes I have to charge it after a full day when I use the phone a lot.

Regarding Android System background activity: the difference is night and day in terms of battery life for me, and honestly, I don't know what this option is doing because I haven't found a single drawback to have it disable it. I still have the same functionality everywhere and everything is behaving properly. Neither I remember to have this option on my Pixel 2 XL.

Is normal that custom skins drain more battery, but so far I'm achieving the same battery consumptions than with my previous Pixel 2 XL, but is true that there are some options than tend to drain a lot of battery and it should be better to disable them.

;)
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
I'm not convinced that it should make much difference, if any? If Android System was running a lot in the "background", shouldn't "Background use" clock up some time? It's always at "0" for me. Also, this background activity setting re-enables itself automatically after a reboot.

By the way, off topic sorry, but can you test this please?:

https://xdaforums.com/showpost.php?p=76460636&postcount=43
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] turtuv:
Unbelievable [emoji50]

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[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Galaxo60:
I have to say that this option is really random, sometimes it behaves properly, and sometimes was eating 50% of my battery. I'm not taking chances anymore and I preferred just to disable it the whole time, and so far has work for me, but indeed you have to disable it manually each time you reboot the phone.

About the tests, I will do it later because currently I'm kind of busy at work.

;)
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] xmatharux:
I've tried disabling background activity but doesn't seem to have made any difference? After screen it's the highest battery usage at 17%
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
In fact it doesn't, I believe. I experimented with it for quite a few days, didn't make any difference.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Galaxo60:
I have noticed that for some people it makes a difference and for others is the same; dunno what could be the culprit.

:confused:
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] xmatharux:
After a full cycle use of the battery what are people's averages on Android system battery use ? ( In terms of % and mah)
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
Man, that test only takes 1-2 minutes - don't give me the work excuse hehe. It's really strange - no one seems to want to test it (well, I've had one person confirm the "issue" so far on these forums, and no one reporting that they don't have it).

I don't think Android System is impacting my battery as badly as some others - I had what I consider to be a "heavy" day use recently (forgot to take screenshot) of about 15-16 hours on battery, roaming LTE enabled for 10+ hours (Wi-Fi for 2-3 hours), Samsung Internet in use for about 2.5 hours, Skype messaging in use for nearly an hour, a reading app in use for nearly an hour - SOT was nearly 6 hours (about 5 hours 45 minutes if I recall) with 10% remaining. Android System was well below Screen, Samsung Internet and Skype, so I doubt disabling its background activity would make any difference. AOD was enabled and in use for over 5 hours, so that certainly sucked off more battery than if it was disabled.

I managed to get 10 hours 59 minutes SOT with "light" usage as I posted a week or two ago, but at least 4-5 hours of that was watching offline movies. So this illustrates how you can get really different SOT depending on your use. I also think roaming LTE uses more battery than non-roaming. There are just so many different variables with SOT that it's often misleading when people post SOT without describing how they used their phone in some detail. For example, reading apps and video watching don't drain the battery much relative to SOT - if you did these activities for 5-6 hours, you can easily still have 60-70% battery left. This means you could then do some heavier activities like Facebook/Skype or even some gaming, and still achieve over 7-8 hours SOT. Another variable I noticed for those who enable Auto-brightness like me is battery drain when using your phone outside in the daylight - the screen brightness will go into a "hyper-max" setting which drains the battery faster.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] bassgenerator:
olalaaaaa... nice work and beautiful deep sleep. Exynos EU.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
U should as well mention the tweaks and workarounds implemented for users to get a better "insight".
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] bassgenerator:
as always, I use the same settings. banned about 122 bloatware applications according to instructions, AOD: OFF, GMAIL, Viber, Telegram, Wifi, and mobile data turned on, WQHD

edit: automatic brightness, GPS battery saving.

I do not use Facebook or messenger. my communication is Viber, Telegram and GMAIL. and most importantly, I do not use the Chrome browser, but I use a Samsung browser that has half the less battery consumption at the same time.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Galaxo60:
I noticed better standby times with the latest update.

:)
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
Location services mode ? Gallery sync? What all in accounts syncing kept on? cloud syncing? Bixby? Any power saver options? Find my mobile? Auto brightness? Etc.?
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
I think it would be more useful if people reported (or at least estimated) how long Wi-Fi and Mobile Data were actually enabled (and in use) for - we all know that if Wi-Fi is in use, then Mobile Data will not be in use. Mobile data (particularly "roaming") certainly drains more battery than Wi-Fi.

To give an example of how different things can be, I've made some observations over the last couple of days. As you will know, I reported about 5 hours 45 minutes SOT above (with 10% battery left) with 10+ hours of roaming "Mobile Data" being enabled and in use to varying degrees (read the rest of the above post to get some other details of my use). In the last 12-24 hours, I've pretty much had a very similar style of using the phone except for one difference - Mobile Data wasn't used at all, but Wi-Fi instead for 10 hours or so. Interestingly I'm observing that "Android System" is relatively higher than previously (perhaps Mobile Data uses Android System less instead of the actual apps, compared to when using Wi-Fi?). But despite this higher Android System drain, I'm getting more battery life than before (which isn't surprising and most people here know that Mobile Data sucks more battery than Wi-Fi) - I've clocked 3 hours 27 mins SOT and still have 54% battery. AOD says it's been used for over 5 hours, just to put things in more context, as I notice many people reporting battery life here have AOD disabled. I've been on battery for just over 11 hours 30 mins.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] bassgenerator:
bigger preview

I do not understand why my video was not included in my statistics: Thelma, which takes about 2 hours.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
You have over 6 hours SOT, and I can see that playing Hearts and using Samsung Internet took up 2.5 hours - so what took the other 3.5 hours? I'm just curious, as I think you've been using Wi-Fi mostly (not Mobile Data), which would support one of the points I made in my previous post - Android System seems to "absorb" the time used by apps?

In other words, do you think you spent more than 2.5 hours playing Hearts and using Samsung Internet?

EDIT: I see you added that you spent 2 hours watching a movie, but that still leaves another 1.5 hours not accounted for.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] bassgenerator:
so ... mobile data I used to this morning. from 18 to 6 my work change. I'm now home and I'm already using Wifi. I think the 2 hours is just the movie I mentioned.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Galaxo60:
Sometimes it happens for me that the YouTube or other application doesn't appear in the graph itself.

:confused:
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] bassgenerator:
use this

https://android.gadgethacks.com/how-to/safest-way-disable-all-bloatware-your-galaxy-s9-s9-0183427/
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
A note : Even though Wi-Fi takes over mobile data when made available, if mobile data is kept on simultaneously with Wi-Fi , it eats up more battery as the modem has to constantly search for data Network to keep it connected even though it consumes ZERO mobile data.

When in roaming, the modem often ends up swtiching and searching for available data networks and hence more power consumption.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] turtuv:
Very unhappy. And I don't understand why the stand by time is the same with usage time

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[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
U r still having acceptable batterylife looking at the total runtime.

... I keep repeating the same- the ones having very good batterylife with the Exynos are the ones who more or less took "measures" to achieve it. Stay happy the way it is or take some other boat to sail.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
I think it's hard to conclude anything definitive in this thread as very few have actually reported exactly what they're doing with their phones and whether or not they've done any "tweaking". For me, battery life is generally excellent and most "tweaks" are actually disabling things that other phones don't have in the first place. I just noticed another one of those "tweaks" which may help with decreasing battery drain even more - in Bixby - "Bixby Settings"---"Privacy"---"Bixby Home content providers", there appears to be several "content providers" that by default data is sent to. I'm a little frustrated, not because this could have saved more battery (I don't need more battery life with this phone!), but because data was being sent out by default hehe - sneaky Samsung!

I do use Bixby occasionally with the long press Bixby button (for example, it's quite useful asking it what the weather will be or to set an alarm quickly etc). The short press Bixby button has been re-mapped to switching on the torch (via bxActions, which I'm noticing drains a very small amount of battery) - this is very useful for me, and it's nice being able to switch on the torch without bringing the phone out of standby.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
U bring me one person in this thread who got very good batterylife and did not "tweak" the phone. Period. Tweaking stands for "counting from not using a particular feature that Samsung has implemented to disabling stuff that Samsung has implemented". Bixby and AOD other flagships don't have, but it's worth mentioning that no other current gen flagships require more or less tweaks like uninstalling of social media stuff like fb, insta..., gallery sync off, cloud sync off, auto brightness off, package disablers etc. etc. to get a very good batterylife. I keep testing a bunch of phones every few months.. And s9+ exynos is on top from BOTTOM [MENTION=1007294]battery[/MENTION] endurance even when AOD & Bixby kept off.

Just for a reference(currently that I'm checking) : a midranger redmi note 5 Pro is having more than two times the endurance of s9+, last year's 5t is having almost twice the endurance of s9+...

*all dual sims*.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
The point was also that "tweaking" can also drain more battery, like using bxActions (although the extra battery drain from this is very small). But the main point is that most people reporting good battery life (not just in this thread, but in many others across other forums too) haven't actually mentioned exactly how they are using their phones and what "tweaks" they are using. I think things unique to Samsung like Bixby and "Advanced features" by default probably use stuff like "Android System" more than other Android phones.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
Thats why I said even disabling Bixby and Auto brightness off, it failed to come close to other mid, top tier flagships.

Ask them what all tweaks they opted for, and then the truth comes out , just like I asked a few in this thread and the rest are self explanatory.

And so, EOD, it's Samsung messing up . None needs forceful advanced features and stuff at the cost of significant lower batterylife and then start disabling features one by one for the love of batterylife.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
Actually I'm still waiting for most of the people who have posted very good battery life in this thread to post more details. I've certainly seen in several other threads and forums where people claim they leave things as "default" with "everything" enabled, whatever that means. Again, without knowing how one uses their phones in a lot of detail, it's very hard to draw any firm conclusions. There are way more variables than just "tweaks" - as I said, those that "tweak" may also be doing other "tweaks" which make their battery life worse etc. Also those that report bad battery life may also be doing very heavy tasks and/or making use of every single aspect of Samsung's "environment".

As the saying goes, you can't have your cake and eat it too - if you want a really nice display with lots of different and useful features enabled and be a heavy user, you're going to have to sacrifice something like battery life. It seems the "perfect" phone doesn't exist, as then we wouldn't have so many different brands still surviving and competing. Probably the most optimal phone for most people is not actually the "flagships", but the cheaper mid-range phones - most people would still achieve what they need in everyday life with probably better battery life etc too. However, many of us just can't help having the "latest and greatest".

Anyway, I'm grateful that I'm not one of those people who aren't happy with the battery life on the S9+ (exynos) - ultimately that's all that matters (that you as an individual is satisfied) and you won't know until you've tested/tried I suppose. I'm certainly very grateful that I've not had to resort to disabling anything just for the sake of battery life.

EDIT: by the way, what do people mean by "disabling" Bixby? I think the only way to disable it properly is to go into root or similar. Otherwise it's certainly still running in the background to some extent even if you "hide" it as much as possible.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Galaxo60:
Honestly I don't know what's the obsession or the fear to tweak or remove things you don't use, even on my Pixel 2 XL I had to disable some things for it to give me good battery time.

We don't have to use all and every feature the manufacturers offer; they offer a lot of feature and options and we pick the ones that better suit us.

If I tweak and remove things I don't use, who cares?, the point is having the options to choose and make the phone as I like and want.

I think you guys are getting too obsessed with the topic of "having to use a phone with no tweaks".

Every chip is different, and every usage and patterns as well; battery can be impacted by hundred of things everyday. If you only care about battery, get a mid range phone with a mid range processor and for sure it will last 2-3 days.

Worst case scenario, if you are not happy with the battery, just sell the phone and move on, no need to come here over and over to say that people that's getting good battery is because they tweak, root and remove everything in the phone.

This "tweaking" thing is getting annoying.

:eek:
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] bassgenerator:
My charm for excellent battery life
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Galaxo60:
I just disable background activity of the whole Android System and so far I haven't noticed any drawback.

I haven't yet messed around with ADB and 3rd party applications for disabling things.

Still is a nice tip to have in mind.

:o
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
1.When features go out of proportion, it takes a toll. One example is - Just like you wondering at what the hell that android system up there eating battery unpredictably and what the hell it does.....!!!

2.Tell me one example of what did u have to disable with the pixel 2 xl to get good batterylife. There's none to disable in the first place. And NO, I did not disable a single feature in it to have very good batterylife when I had one. And neighter I uninstalled fb, Ista or took any other measures in any top dogs to get good endurance. In Samsung - one is bound to especially in the Exynos S9s.

3. Any retail version of a smartphone right out of the box is to be used flawlessly without going through package disablers and such to avoid a huge dent on the batterylife & performance, and smartphones are meant to be that way unless its a beta version, engineering version or specifically mentioned by the manufacturer, if any. If one has to take help of package disablers and even have to disable standard features of it or to even refrain from installing popular social media stuff that's NOT REQURIED TO BE DONE IN OTHER FLAGSHIPS to get acceptable batterylife that's nuisance for Samsung to even call it a retail flagship unit in the first place.

4. U r NONE to advice if I should leave this thread when I'm not fine with the phone. I'll write whatever I want and, if u r getting butthurt with my sharp factual comments, just ignore my responses.

5. If tweaking thing is getting annoying for you, there is absolutely nothing I can do about it, bear it or stop looking at my messages.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] bassgenerator:
how did you disable Android-based system activities? do you have a notification problem now? show where you've forbidden.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
I think one's carrier also influences battery life to some extent? For me, on the S7 (from over two years ago), Facebook came by default and I couldn't fully uninstall it (only disable it). This was particularly annoying because I don't use Facebook at all. When I got the S9+, I was pleasantly surprised to see that Facebook wasn't installed at all by default. This makes me wonder how much those apps that people commonly refer to as "carrier bloatware" affects battery drain, even when they are disabled (some say you need to completely remove them via root etc to truly prevent them running).
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] denja12:
my battery is doing great, i'm pulling easily 5/6 hours of sot with a day of idle, though i suppose it does matter on your usage as ive seen some people get bad results in our s9 group on telegram thats in my sig
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] bassgenerator:
If I disable the Android system to run in the background I can expect some problems or it's fine. Do you have someone so set up?
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] Virgo_Guy:
Show those "threads and forums" links here.

False..

Samsung's own s7 edge wasn't sacrificing batterylife like this S9 plus Exynos with bloats. S9 plus snapdragon doesn't sacrifice batterylife with Samsung bloats and carrier specific bloats.

Huawei mate 10 pro, p20 pro don't sacrifice on batterylife with Huawei bloats.

LGs latest Gs & Vs aren't sacrificing batterylife with bloats installed.

Pixels, HTCs, OnePlus are not even in favour of bloats to irritate users. Ever seen users of these using package disablers and adb commands to disable stuff??? Rare. Package disablers are used by Samsung flagship users for a reason :laugh:

Or disabling syncing, using only wifi or data at a time? Keeping auto brightness off etc? Never required.

So what ? Samsung is always ahead when it comes to bloats and unnecessarily features reducing performance and batterylife.

No it doesn't. Rooting not required to completely disable it from functioning. Only to remove, rooting required.

Bixby is a combination of Bixby home & Bixby voice and can be completely disabled and so the word "disable". Post this, it simply doesn't take a toll on batterylife as none of its services run post disabling it unless manually you enable.
[Samsung Galaxy S9+ Real Life Review] ssj100:
We'll just have to agree to disagree. You seem to take a tone of offence or disbelief when many others aren't as miserable as you about the S9+ exynos battery life, as if you're wanting to drag these people into your camp - I think that's why Galaxo60 responded the way he did. I see you're still believing that the Snapdragon variant of the S9+ don't have any of these "issues" - I'm tempted to buy you one including shipping hehe so you can hopefully also say:

"I'm grateful that I'm not one of those people who aren't happy with the battery life on the S9+ (exynos) - ultimately that's all that matters (that you as an individual is satisfied) and you won't know until you've tested/tried I suppose. I'm certainly very grateful that I've not had to resort to disabling anything just for the sake of battery life."

That's interesting. I find Bixby useful, so I don't want to "disable" it, but I'm curious - can you describe the steps to "disable" it?

EDIT: Like this?: https://www.androidcentral.com/how-completely-disable-bixby

If so, then do you think that actually saves any battery verses simply never using/activating bixby? Also, does that prevent things like the auto-updating of Bixby?