Sense battery draining quickly

[SarasotaSarah]

Hello,

My fitbit Sense is three days old and the battery has already needed recharging. I don't have any notifications (email, phone, health) on and don't have the display on always on. I turned GPS off all the exercise tracking options. Which leads me to question why I bought a smartwatch that needs all the smart options turned off to deliver promised battery life. The battery has already drained 12% in seven hours. At this rate I will need to charge this six day battery every two days.

I am so disappointed. I am regretting this purchase already. 

Any insight or help is appreciated. 

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

[AlvaroFitbit]

@SarasotaSarah Welcome to the Fitbit Community!

Sorry to hear that your Fitbit Sense's battery is draining quickly and thank you for troubleshooting this issue. Have you charged your tracker since you set it up? The setup process does impact the battery specially if you include the firmware update. Still I suggest you try charging it by plugging it for a couple of hours directly to your computer's USB port (try different ports) or use an UL-certified USB adapter. You can follow these instructions to help improve the battery life.

I look forward to your reply.

[fanUk26]

I have the same issue , i have tried everything and still cant get more than 2/3 days

[SunsetRunner]

It would be good if we could turn the GPS off on the sense. I noticed there is a GPS tab on the settings on my sense settings online,but no way to turn it off.

[fanUk26]

it would be good if we could simply have the 6+ days promised 

[N8teGee]

Are any of you using the spO2 clock face by any chance? I've found it to be a big battery drain. Switching away from that to another face has improved my battery life hugely, unfortunately at the cost of not recording sleep spO2. 

[Morbragan]

I don’t have the spO2 clock face and I can still check it within the app! Check the app and I’m sure it’ll tell you, unless you mean that you can’t see it on the go

[Micsb]

My Sense lost 32% over the past 48 hours, where 8% is from a half hour run with GPS and Deezer playing music. If the battery drain, going from 99% is linear it will result in10 days on battery until completely depleted used solely for logging and no apps, exercises etc.
With GPS only, no music a 30 min run will cost about 3% battery. Playing music with a headset connected drains a significant amount of power.

I have Atlas watch face, medium light, turn on display at twist of arm activated. The SpO2 watch face drained roughly10% during the night vs 3% with the Atlas watch face.

[SarasotaSarah]

Alvaro.

Thank you for your suggestions. I have since deleted the Starbucks and Pandora apps from the watch (in addition to turning off email, phone and text capabilities) as well as deleting the FitBit widget for Android from my phone. Since then that combination of no Starbucks, Pandora, Widget, GPS and not wearing it at night are delivering on the promised and marketed battery life with the watch loosing about 12% a day. I do not have the sp02 watch face, in fact that has never been measured on my watch, even when I wore it at night. 

Perhaps you may look to revise your marketing to say battery life 2-6 days depending on how you use it, if all capabilities marketed are used count on 2 days. If the watch is simply used as pedometer count on 6 days. 

[braveheart8]

@SarasotaSarah i agree with you. One deciding factor that I bought Sense was because according to their marketing, it would take 6 days to recharge! But now - it's only more than 30 hrs and my Sense's battery is 44% 😢 

[JACherry]

Yes 6 days was BS, I have to charge it on the 3rd day usually. Still better than other options I guess.  Seems the majority of what they promised with this Sense has been complete BS

[SunsetRunner]

I have had mine now for almost a month but same issues with battery. Looks like all the functions it offers is too much for the battery. GPS only switched on when doing outdoor activities and in one case, I started a hike with 80% battery but 4.5 hrs later my watch went flat but hike was not done.  
3 days max with no GPS. 

[SunsetRunner]

No sp02 clock face. Just basic but 3 days battery without using GPS or 1 day if that With GPS 

[Micsb]

That is weird, something else must be draining your battery.

Mine has drained 57% after 86 hours. Having GPS activated during morning runs, listening to music on one of the trips. Using alarm to wake me up, having always on display during a crossfit exercise, notifications from phone, using EDA scan etc. This almost result in 6 days.

When running, my GPS drains about 1% per 10min. Your hike should not have drained more than 30-35%.

Just speculating, can it be the phones or watch faces? These two being different from user to user, if the phone app continuously sync with the watch, if the watch face is poorly programmed and keeps the CPU from going into sleep mode. I have the default widgets and only option I changed is the turn on at wrist move, plus using the Atlas clockface. My phone is an iPhone 8 and at the watch is connected to wifi at home.

[EmTe]

Which watch face are you using? Some watch faces uses more battery than others.

[Micsb]

I am using this watch face, called Atlas by Marc Groen, free.

https://gallery.fitbit.com/details/76c1dc33-1bc1-42a7-9adf-6a142fd18949

Before that I have only used the SpO2 clock face and experienced similar higher battery drains, charging it frequently. I don't dare change the watch face as my Sense is working perfectly now 🙂 I am paranoid the watch face somehow could interfere, obstruct or disturb the HR readings and be the cause of some of the complaints here on the forum. 

[BigRalphN]

I just had mine for the first night. It lost 15% but I had the SPO2 face on that claims it's a battery drainer. I haven't been able to find out if it will still track SPO2 without the face. I switched to another this morning. With my ond Ionic battery life seemed to improve after an update or two and the more I wore it. I am not sure. To be honest though, three days is pretty darn good. My old Galaxy watch active 2 barely last 2 days. 

[Micsb]

SpO2 variations will be measured even without the SpO2 clock face. The actual percentage is only measured and recorded when using the SpO2 clock. I.e. the metric will be missing from the Health Metrics tab, while variations are visible under sleepscore/restoration. I found this is sufficient for my daily use and I will switch back to the SpO2 clock if being sick and worried about oxygen saturation.

[LizzyFitbit]

Hi everyone! It's great to see you here in the forums and welcome to the new members. @N8teGee, thanks for your insights.

Thanks for letting me know about the battery short life issues experienced with your Sense and the steps that you've tried on your own. I understand how you're feeling about not having enough charge to take advantage of your watch and let me give you a hand with this. As you may know, the Sense should last 6+ days after a full charge. However, you may have to charge it more often if certain features, such as the SpO2 Signature or an animated clock face, GPS or the Always-On Display function, are frequently being used. This doesn't mean that you shouldn't use them, but as with any other electronic device the features will impact its battery.

If you've not done so, I'd recommend to try the troubleshooting tips described by @AlvaroFitbit to maximize the battery life of your watches. 

Please keep me posted with the outcome.

[HSS79]

Would be nice if there is a battery health tracking info like in android phone, that show a graphical  history of battery levels and which apps are draining the battery.