topic Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain in Mobile Apps & Services

Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

battdrain — Wed, 17 Aug 2022 18:06:39 GMT

Hi everyone!

I noticed that Samsung Health is draining an insane amount of battery on my phone (Pixel 6 Pro) overnight. I've attached the screenshots--strangely enough, it seems to drain a normal amount of battery during the day, and then it starts draining upwards of 20% of battery every two hours! I don't have sleep tracking turned on and I have a Galaxy Watch, but I disconnect it at night. Is there a reason for this insane battery drain? I'll go to bed on a full battery and wake up with less than 50% left.

I use Samsung Health, so ideally I wouldn't have to uninstall it. I like that it tracks my steps and other stuff (and I think it's the best fitness app for the watch), but there shouldn't be any reason why it's draining so much battery when the phone is just sitting on my bedside table.

Thanks for all the help!12AM usage. Pretty normal.2AM usage. Still pretty normal, I went to bed at 3.4AM usage suddenly goes up by a ton.6AM usage very high still.8AM (I woke up at 10AM) very high usage.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

John_Cowell — Thu, 18 Aug 2022 06:44:16 GMT

I'm seeing the exact same thing (Galaxy watch 4 on a pixel 6 pro). I'd updated the firmware to android 13 and have been noticing it since then.

Now using at least 20% per day compared to 4% previously.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

Howgie — Fri, 19 Aug 2022 07:19:55 GMT

Hi there. I have the exact same issue with Samsung health on my pixel 6 pro. I am also running the latest Android 13 beta version. I also have a galaxy watch 4 which i don't wear at night. It is only sitting on the charger.

The app is draining the battery constantly and the phone barely goes into sleep mode at night.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

Rahul Deshpande — Fri, 19 Aug 2022 13:11:11 GMT

Same problem for on Pixel 6a. Just recently got this phone and noticed that. Even when I restricted background usage it didn't help.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

MonoB — Mon, 22 Aug 2022 15:49:33 GMT

Same on my end. Using a Pixel 6 Pro (albeit still on Android 12) and a Galaxy Watch 4 Classic. Samsung Health suddenly drains about 15 to 20% battery off my phone in 16 hours of mostly being in standby. It used to be less than 5%.

This battery drain thing began a few days ago, I'm guessing after I installed the latest update to Samsung Health (dated August 5th 2022, version 6.22.1.053), so I guess I will be reverting to an older version of the Samsung Health app until Samsung fixes the issue.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

John_Cowell — Mon, 22 Aug 2022 09:49:02 GMT

I've managed to resolve this. After the update to android 13, the health app seemed to allow itself permission to the physical activity setting. By disabling this (as I already track it on the watch), battery usage seems to have returned to normal. The setting seems to keep the app live in the background to pressumably track steps though motion etc. Juts disallow the setting and this seems to work

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

MonoB — Mon, 22 Aug 2022 15:58:50 GMT

Good catch! This should help a lot of people.

Unfortunately I need the physical activity setting enabled on the phone as well as on the watch, because the watch will not reliably track steps taken when walking while pushing for example a lawn mower, grocery cart or baby stroller. Seems like since your arm is not moving all that much when doing any of the above, the watch fails to reliably track the steps taken.

I reverted back to the June 27th version of the app instead, through apkmirror.com, which seems to be working perfectly (including activity tracking). Hopefully Samsung will address this issue sooner rather than later, but knowing Samsung it might take a while.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

Jessimano — Mon, 22 Aug 2022 22:16:53 GMT

Samsung health has been crushing my battery in the last 4-5 days. Not sure if it's because they released their new watches. It's not even background usage, it's just constantly running even though I restricted it's use.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

MichaelBrock — Wed, 24 Aug 2022 12:05:36 GMT

I'm having the exact same issue. I have had the Galaxy 4 for 3 or 4 months and it hasn't been an issue. The last few days my phone, a Pixel 6a, has been draining much faster than usual. In the last 24 hours Samsung Health has accounted for 23% of my total battery usage. I'm still on android 12 and I haven't recently made any changes to either the app or the watch settings. I do not wear the watch at night and so Sleep analysis is not on (but the drainage is consistent across the day). Last night for every hour after taking off the watch Samsung Health account for 42% of the battery usage.

I do not have the phone itself configured to log steps, etc. (I don't even see that it is an option in the app).

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

MonoB — Thu, 25 Aug 2022 14:41:23 GMT

Update: The June 27th version had other issues (it never gave med a sleep score for my sleep tracking) so I reverted back to the June 2nd version instead, which seems to work.

The June 2nd version has version number 6.22.0.069 if anyone else wants to revert to avoid the battery drain.

Also: the latest Samsung Health version dated August 21st with version number 6.22.2.007 still has the same battery drain issue as the previous version dated August 12th and August 5th.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

tprieboj — Sun, 04 Sep 2022 19:36:23 GMT

Same here. After update to android 13. Extreme battery drain from Samsung health.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

P6P_GW4 — Tue, 06 Sep 2022 21:34:13 GMT

Same issue on my Pixel 6 Pro and Galaxy Watch 4 classic. I'm giving the revoked physical activity a shot now.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

tempeViking — Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:39:07 GMT

Same problem with Pixel 6, A13 on the September security patch with the latest Samsung Health app.

I enabled the app about 10 days ago and put it on the restricted battery list. It never seems to actually show active when I check but in the last day it displays as active on the Battery usage list as having been active for 20 hours. I Force Stopped the app but it's a zombie and kept coming back so I assume it's a daisy chain from the Samsung Wearable app.

I don't want to restrict the wearable app because the notifications of phone and text messages are important to me.

I turned off the Physical activity permissions. SH app has a host of other permissions like Body Sensors and so forth.

Does anyone know what permissions the app *actually* needs?

It feels like there's something wrong with the last couple of revisions. Hope Samsung gets this sorted out, but I suspect it's not a high priority since they have yet to migrate One UI. Maybe that's why Pixel users are seeing this first (A12 users not withstanding unless maybe they were on the beta program).

Edit: In case someone stumbles across this (or I need to refer to it again in the future), turning off step tracking on the app, Autodetect activity on the app and Physical activity permissions seems to have helped after a 24 hour test. Samsung health is no longer showing as a significant consumer of battery power.

One must first disable Bluetooth on your phone to disconnect your watch temporarily. Then one should be able to turn off the Autodetect activity and steps on the phone. Otherwise these options may not be available.

I'd still like to know what permissions are actually required by Samsung health.

Edit: I missed an item, at least it wasn't clear as I read my notes. I set up a new phone and did the above, but Samsung Health was still alive in the background. In Samsung Health, I also turned off Location Information, too. Now, the app isn't running in the background. Overnight battery drain was negligible, no sign of Samsung Health draining the battery.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

Members_V7RyLZI — Tue, 20 Sep 2022 08:36:30 GMT

Same problem with a Pixel 6a with the latest security patch, connected to a Galaxy Watch 4.

Of note, the watch battery is also being drained at night, which i suspect (and hope) is the same issue. Yesterday i charged it up to 100% before going to sleep, disconnected it from the charger, and woke up today to 20% battery... Inconvenient to say the least.

As suggested, i've now disabled activity autodetection and step tracking on the Health app, and removed the physical activity permission to check if it helps.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

Heib386 — Mon, 26 Sep 2022 15:30:25 GMT

Exact same problem, Pixel 6. I disabled the recommended things, lets see how it works out

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

kushalkothari — Sat, 08 Oct 2022 05:50:45 GMT

Been facing the same issue. Pixel 6, Android 13 beta, watch 4. Have switched off physical activity tracking. Let's see it it fixed things

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

GuilhermeGades — Fri, 14 Oct 2022 10:53:08 GMT

I'm having the exact same issue on a Xiaomi Mi 9. Seems like doesn't matter the phone, the app is just consuming an insane amount of battery.

It consumed 489.79 mAh (22%) since I fully charged my phone.

I disabled the personal activity thing, let's see if it helps

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

Jessimano — Fri, 14 Oct 2022 16:38:04 GMT

Since this post, I deleted Samsung health and both of my Samsung watches stopped working independently of one another. Went back to using UnderArmor's Map My - to map bike rides/walks etc. and my battery has been doing way better.

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

creb — Mon, 17 Oct 2022 06:20:05 GMT

Same for me with my Google Pixel 5 and Galaxy Watch 3, and now with my Google Pixel 7 and Galaxy Watch 3. Please Samsung do something there this is really a big waste of energy...

Re: Samsung Health Overnight Battery Drain

tomiisek — Tue, 15 Nov 2022 12:17:20 GMT

I had the same issue, Samsung Health drained 25% of battery every 8 hours with my completely new Sony 1 III so I had to charge completely new cell phone twice a day. After I disabled steps counting in Samsung Health the steps counting works with exactly same precision as before but Samsung Health drains only 1% of battery every 8 hours. The problem is that I didn't find any possibility to disable steps counting in Samsung Health for more then 24 hours, I need to disable steps counting every day. Is there any possibility to disable steps counting in Samsung Health until the next activation, not only for 24 hours?