[grimman]

Meanwhile I get 3-4 days on my Galaxy S5 (which can be further increased with their "ultra" power saving mode). Battery life has come a LONG way (again) in recent times. I'm almost back to feature phone levels and I can honestly say it's a bit of a relief. I went on a weekend trip to London and forgot my charger... no problem whatsoever. Just a couple of years ago I'd have been forced to trudge down to a crummy store and buy a charger right there and then.

[quickdraw46]

Doesn't the ultra mode pretty much leave the phone unusable? Everything except Phone calls and SMS is off. Same can be achieved with any Android smartphone or switching off Mobile Data/WiFi/GPS/Bluetooh on the iPhone, I used to do this when hiking etc with my iPhone and it lasted me days as-well.

[leapius]

Actually you can still use the 3g / browser in that mode (except it is in black and white).

[rsynnott]

Is this a joke?

[BuildTheRobots]

No. My understanding is that with an AMOLED screen it uses substantially more power when displaying a range of colours.

http://www.extremetech.com/mobile/180110-how-samsung-galaxy-...

[CocaKoala]

This isn't a dig at you personally, but the idea of somebody saying "This phone is unusuable! You can't do anything except make calls and text with it!" is just so hilarious to me.

[ShaneOG]

It is, until you start replacing the word "phone" with "pocket computer". Our smartphones are now computers with phone call making abilities, not phones with some computing abilities.

[enraged_camel]

It's not so hilarious when you consider that this is a smartphone.

But yes, taking things out of context can make them amusing.

[xutopia]

Whenever someone says that I'm inclined to say that all statistics show that Android users use their phone less than iPhone users. Could it be that you use it less than an iPhone user? Be honest now... could you drain the battery in less than a day if you used it thoroughly?

[hnal943]

"Android users" includes people getting free android phones because there is practically no alternative. They use their phone as a phone, nothing more. I'll wager that Galaxy S5 users are going to be far more similar to iPhone users in their usage patterns than the average android user.

[rev_bird]

My Note 3 has wifi and data running all the time, and bluetooth/GPS running whenever I'm in the car (~an hour a day, usually?), and I haven't ever gotten more than a day on a charge. Are you using that much less than I am, or is my dumb, giant screen finally catching up with me?

[hnal943]

I have had the same experience with my note 3. Everyone raves about the battery life, but there's no way I could make it through a day with out a full charge.

[nicholassmith]

When I held a S5 it felt a bit too thick to be comfortable for my hand size. I don't think I've got particularly small hands, but it was definitely a bit too much for longer than quicker interaction use.

[Shivetya]

You can always hold your phone up to the screen and determine if a new one is going to be a bit too large...

http://www.piliapp.com/actual-size/

its not perfect, you cannot simulate wrapping your hands around the device but you can actually hold an existing device up and get a good idea of what it will be like

[nicholassmith]

Sure, and on screen the S5 might not look too big, but in my hands it felt ungainly and awkward for anything longer than a few minutes. The point I was making was that the 6+ might be a better tradeoff with less battery life but a slimmer profile to 'fit' better in hand.

[hnal943]

On the other hand, the first thing I did when I got my note 3 is buy a case so it wasn't so blasted thin. I think the fact that there is barely any side edge on these phones makes them difficult to hold onto.