Google Pixel 3 XL Battery Review: Day-Long Usage With Fast Charging

What exercise yous wait for when you're spending nearly a fortune on a smartphone? Is it just great looks, good camera, and lag-free operation. For me, a reliable battery is one of the nigh important factors in deciding whether a smartphone is swell or not, and it's almost necessary for a flagship.

During my short courtship with the Pixel three XL, I've come to adore the phone and while I'm learning all near information technology, I remember a lot of yous might exist wondering near how it holds up when it comes to bombardment life.

Before I begin talking about the functioning of the battery, I must bring to your attention that with the upgrade to Pixel 3 Xl, Google has knocked 90mAH off the battery. While the Pixel 2 XL has a 3,520mAh bombardment, Pixel 3 Forty (simply so to salve you lot of the math) comes with a 3,430mAh battery. Both take nearly the aforementioned dimensions and then a smaller phone cannot exist used as an excuse by Google for the smaller battery.

Despite the reduction in battery capacity, Google is confident well-nigh the day-long battery life, but I am not one to have that claim seriously. It is simply fair to put the tech giant'southward claims to exam, which can be a little off the mark. Google has refined the Pixel without making stark changes under the hood, besides the mandatory upgrade to the SoC. So, permit'south come across how the battery holds up.

Pixel iii XL Bombardment Life

The Pixel iii XL has been kind to me when it comes to battery life. My usual usage consisted of playing games for the Pixel 3 gaming review, taking a ton of pictures (why not?), and enjoying the HDR videos on YouTube. I had mixed connectivity with cellular data and Wi-Fi on. The Pixel 3 Xl – like the older Twoscore Pixel – uses a QHD+ display and I adopt keeping it in the Ambient Display or "always on" mode, which means that's another striking on the bombardment.

With all of that clarified, let'southward take a await at how long the Pixel iii Twoscore lasts typically. Onmoderate usage – with infrequent gaming, shorter camera experiments, including Playground filters and some surfing – I got 19 hours of usage with a screen-on-time (SOT) of 4 hours.

When I pushed the Pixel 3 Xl to its limits with longer gaming sessions and a lot more than photos, I got more than 6 and a half hours of SOT with an overall usage of more than 15 hours, which is decent plenty given that the phone can be charged wirelessly too.

Theambient display gobbled up effectually iv% bombardment which could have added between thirty minutes to an hour of extra usage, depending on how you use the phone.

If coincidental photography, social media, moderate gaming (i.eastward not lengthy sessions in graphics-heavy games such as PUBG), moderate to heavy YouTube and Netflix usage is what makes up your smartphone usage, this battery will easily last you well over 24 hours in usage. You can easily bet on it.

Switching the Adaptive Effulgence off might assist you get an extra hour of battery backup but doing so might accept abroad from your premium experience with the device because Adaptive Brightness is really on point in the Pixel 3.

Adaptive Battery

Since you get the latest Android Pie on the Pixel 3, Adaptive Battery is 1 feature which improves the battery backup noticeably through AI-assisted learning. The feature takes note of the apps you lot open the almost and will prioritize resource allocation to them in guild to reduce consumption of the battery.

Android Adaptive Battery

The feature certainly adds more than fourth dimension to the battery's backup merely information technology likewise means the apps, which you open less often, could exist killed in the background, or accept longer to open up. This might also be because of the 4GB RAM, which sometimes feels insufficient when we expect at what the competition offers. We'll test this more than thoroughly in our performance deep-dive.

Google Pixel 3 Twoscore: Time To Recharge

Within the box bundle, Google supplies an 18W fast charger which is supposed to exist pleasantly fast. In my case, the charger took effectually 100 minutes (1 60 minutes and twoscore minutes) to get from 5% to 100%. In gild to charge the battery from five% to fifty%, it takes between 35-40 minutes but you lot better spend that extra hour to get the full charge so that the Pixel iii XL can endure through the day.

Like virtually premium devices, charging slows downwards as it reaches completion to forbid the bombardment from overheating. During the course of charging, the phone and the glass back remains at a comfy temperature with no noticeable signs of overheating.

Pixel three Forty Wireless Charging on Pixel Stand

The Pixel Stand is a new accessory that complements the Pixel 3'south wireless charging support. With the launch of the Pixel Stand, Google also took a jab at Apple which is yet to utter a word about AirPower.

Coming back to the Pixel Stand, it allows the Pixel three to sit on information technology vertically and information technology's ideal for your work desk-bound, tables and bedstands. Apart from charging the smartphone, the Pixel Stand up converts it into a smart display of sorts, with piece of cake toggles to interact with letters and notifications, play music or radio, telephone call people, or gear up alarms. You lot can even only use your vocalization to interact thanks to Google Banana.

Pixel 3 XL Battery — The new Pixel Stand

Pixel stand charges the Pixel 3 at 10W which is commonly the maximum rate supported past most Qi-compliant devices. You tin can also charge an iPhone XS or the Galaxy S9 or Note ix on the Pixel Stand.

You'll have to purchase the Pixel Stand separately for $79 (effectually Rs 5,800) but if you're really looking forrad to cut cords, it is something you should be grateful to Google for. There's no discussion on pricing or availability in India but since the Pixel Stand is listed on Google Store, information technology should be available with or after the Pixel iii launch.

Pixel iii Forty Battery: Justifies Flagship Condition But No 'Superfast' Charging

Living upward to our expectations, the Pixel iii XL'due south battery fill-in is good plenty considering its flagship status. The smartphone still lasts almost a solar day with moderate usage, fifty-fifty with the QHD+ display, and I think this kind of battery fill-in is preferred and desirable.

The merely aspect that has left me longing is the lack of any super fast charging technology like Dash Charge on OnePlus devices and VOOC Flash Charging by OPPO. Just to make up for this is the Pixel Stand which will let you accuse your Pixel 3 Forty overnight while also using it every bit a smart display.

If you're notwithstanding trying to make your mind up about the smartphone, you lot can check out our full review of the Pixel three XL and stay tuned to our YouTube aqueduct for a video review soon.

Pre-order Google Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 Forty on Flipkart (starts at Rs 71,000)