Vibrate and battery life

[gadgetgal]

I recently attempted vibrate mode again, and forget it. It really does eat battery life. I used my phone extremely moderately yesterday, had it on vibrate and only had one reminder. I was down to 54% this morning which never happens when vibrate is disabled even when I use my phone more. I have one mid-day reminder which is non work related and I never get to it on time because I'm not always looking at my phone. I can't have my phone turned on at work. It's ridiculous that one of the recommendations to preserve battery life is to disable vibrate which is a fundamentally helpful function that adds genuinely to the utility of a phone. I never had this issue before 4 and 4S. Does anyone else have this issue or any suggestions?

 

[lwerle]

Yes! Use the phone how you want. If you don't use the functions because you wanna save your battery, get rid of a smartphone. It's just part of the deal. The more functions, the more battery usage. I have to charge every night. Sometimes during the day. It's ok. Enjoy the phone!

 

[jmp316]

I seriously doubt that vibrating caused that large of a battery drain. I could check to see if it's something else such as losing cell signal throughout the day. This will drain the battery fast if the phone is constantly searching for a signal.

 

[Rugaby]

If you only received one alert that caused the phone to vibrate this absolutely could not be the cause of such a drastic battery drain.
If you were to receive alerts often, say fifty to a hundred before mid day I would believe that would cause a larger battery drain.

 

[gadgetgal]

Thank you everybody. It is obviously something else, because it has gotten significantly worse. I turned vibrate back off, and even so, ten times worse almost. example: in 23 hours, my phone dropped to 3% and I had only made ONE 5 minute phone call the whole time, and also swiped to unlock as I had a reminder at 2 PM which of course I forgot to note since the phone is all quiet now, but it was only 1 hour later when I swiped the reminder off. (could that be any kind of cause? using reminders and not unlocking the screen to note that right away?) But still, midnight I'm now at 28%, again, this is ONE small phone call as the sole usage all day! and left it uncharged just to see, and 3% by 6:30 AM! Next day, I'm watching it drop 10% in 1-2 hours. It varied, but no usage at all. And this time I turned all location services OFF just to see. Battery life was better than the day before, but still, to come home and have it at 50% is ridiculous with again one little phone call. (my job is hectic-I'm in later today). On weekends, my phone gets a good workout, and even then, it wouldn't be at 50%. Most of the time with the very minimal use it would still be in the low 90's of percentage. Any ideas at all? And I have NOT done the software upgrade to 5.1.1 either. I read about battery life issues and decided to wait. And what a laugh because now I'm having my own horrible battery life right after the release-pretty ironic! Any ideas/suggestions? Back it up and restore? Back up to the Cloud or iTunes and restore?

 

[MrMike6by9]

Maybe you need to check your data usage. With AT&T, I can get read-outs of cell data usage. With an app like Dataman, I can see the times of the day when cell data & wifi data is being used on an hourly basis. It also shows what apps used data in that period; typically the last 24 hours. How are you synching? Are you using iCloud, for example? Mind you, checking the phone frequently lights up the display and thereby uses some battery life. Also, as has been suggested, you might be in low signal areas at times with your phone searching for a good connection. Have you tried calibrating the battery or resets? You might have a stuck app. Have you turned on/off Bluetooth? There are many possibles. As was suggested some time ago, the percentage battery status icon just might make some people obsess a bit too much. I wish you luck. If all else fails, go to the Apple store and have it checked.

YMMV

 

[jmp316]

Another possibility/culprit is location services. Some apps have bugs in them that keep the location services on all the time, which is huge battery drain. Is that location arrow stuck up in your menu bar (upper right hand corner)?

 

[Europa]

Try resetting all settings first. If it doesn't help, then you'll need to restore to factory settings. Be sure to sync in iTunes first. You won't lose any media, apps, or contacts if you restore to factory settings. You will, however, lose your game saves and text messages and you'll have to put your settings back in.
Settings > General > Reset > Reset All Settings

 

[gadgetgal]

Another possibility/culprit is location services. Some apps have bugs in them that keep the location services on all the time, which is huge battery drain. Is that location arrow stuck up in your menu bar (upper right hand corner)?

Thanks. The arrow will linger ever so slightly here and there but goes away, and I chalk that up to normal. I did turn Location Services back on, but I individually decide which has access. When I had all Location off, it was ridiculous to not be able to use Siri to ask a question about something where I was at the moment. Also, there is a weather program that has a new feature and it's stupid to have to turn off and on. So I put them back on. Today I'm at 34% at less than 24 hours. But I'll see about that arrow. There isn't a huge difference with location turned on.

 

[gadgetgal]

Try resetting all settings first. If it doesn't help, then you'll need to restore to factory settings. Be sure to sync in iTunes first. You won't lose any media, apps, or contacts if you restore to factory settings. You will, however, lose your game saves and text messages and you'll have to put your settings back in.
Settings > General > Reset > Reset All Settings

Yeah-I had forgotten about that until yesterday. I did that before when I had issues on of my previ0us iPhones. I'll try that today to see before I try a restore.
I've only once ever had to do a full restore. I think it was my iPhone 4.
I used to sync everyday to iTunes by just automatcally plugging into my computer before bed. I may just start doing that again. I usually sync every few days now. My Wifi sync is another that isn't 100% reliable, so to jump start it, I have to plug in every so often anyway. I may see too if that works better again (just a sidebar-another fuss and I've discussed it on topic on another thread)
It's just frustrating because like the one day when it went to 3%. I thought it was great to not have to obsess over charging every night. I'd always been worried about that and finally decided to stop being over cautious as I always have had great standby all day.

ADDENDUM: SUCCESS! Thank you Europa! The Reset All Settings did it! This morning, 5/21, I'm at 91% leaving it uncharged. I intentionally minimized use just yesterday just to see, but left location services on and the like. But I'm glad it's back to businesss, and I'm still not putting 5.1.1 in yet!

and LOL-ADDENDUM #2. Didn't put phone on charger at all today, so it's been off charger since about 10 AM yesterday, so going on 36 hours. I'm now only at 74%! And this is with moderate use today, of several texts, checking my calengoo a few times (which auto syncs), checking my e-mail a couple times, and also one short phone call. So, this is good to go. I will probably not charge until tomorrow morning before work, and no doubt I'll still have half remaining in the morning, and maybe more.