How much does the GPS receiver affect battery life?

[DanMacLeod]

I'm working on an app that uses the geolocation API. I'm wondering if there has been any research on just how much the GPS receiver affects battery life. I'm wondering how much I need to worry about it draining the battery.

[Pietero]

Rougly 15% of battery per hour. Both for devices with built in GPS or not. Haven't tested this yet with versa3 and sense.

No built in GPS means a lot of bluetooth connections. And built in GPS is ofcourse using power

[DanMacLeod]

Any idea if the maximumAge interval matters? I'm wondering if trying to retrieve a position every 30 seconds compared to every 5 seconds would make a difference.

[Pietero · Accepted solution]

That setting will most likely have no effect. GPS remains open on
watchposition.

What you can do is do a set timeout and use the get current position each
30 seconds.

Another option is to use the GPS of the phone an send the position to the
watch each 5 or 30 seconds.