Android Auto and battery drain

Tea-Sir · June 13, 2021

Hi there

I am a newbie to the Android world, I made the switch after more than 10 years of iPhone use. And I need a little info/help from someone with more experience than me.

I have a car with a radio that supports wireless Android Auto, and it all works, just fine. My phone however drains battery fast, approx. 10% for a 30 minute drive. Is that normal? (If I use just Bluetooth for music, it is 3% - 4% for the same drive)

The phone also gets very warm around the top end where the cameras are, a little too hot to keep in pocket to my liking. The phone in question is a Samsung Galaxy S20 FE 4G (Exynos CPU) Is it suppose to get that hot?

The phone does cool down after the drive, it just seems to keep draining the battery a little faster than usual. I installed CPU meter to check, and it seems the CPU does not downclock until after a restart, all cores stay locked at 100%

(I know it is not usage, just clock speed).

I have tried closing all apps after having used Android Auto, but even after 30 minutes, all cores are still at 100%.

Restarting the phone and giving it 5 minutes, all cores are down to 20% - 30%

Any insight would be a appreciated. Thanks in advance

And yeah, the phone and all apps are 100% up to date. I have checked both system updates, Google Play and Galaxy Store.

Tea-Sir · June 15, 2021

Could a moderator try to move this to the troubleshooting forum please. Maybe someone with some knowhow can find it in that sub-forum

@Spotty

And if I tagged the wrong moderator, sorry, you were the only one I could remember the name of

Spotty · June 15, 2021

14 minutes ago, The89Lunder said:

Could a moderator try to move this to the troubleshooting forum please. Maybe someone with some knowhow can find it in that sub-forum

@Spotty

And if I tagged the wrong moderator, sorry, you were the only one I could remember the name of

If you need your post moved you can report your post and select Posted in wrong subforum. Honestly though, I'd leave it in Phones & Tablets. Troubleshooting section moves super fast, and it's mostly PC specific issues so I'm not sure if moving it there would help. If you really want I can move it there and see how it goes.

On 6/13/2021 at 6:39 PM, The89Lunder said:

I have a car with a radio that supports wireless Android Auto, and it all works, just fine. My phone however drains battery fast, approx. 10% for a 30 minute drive. Is that normal? (If I use just Bluetooth for music, it is 3% - 4% for the same drive)

The phone also gets very warm around the top end where the cameras are, a little too hot to keep in pocket to my liking. The phone in question is a Samsung Galaxy S20 FE 4G (Exynos CPU) Is it suppose to get that hot?

Having a quick look at teardown in the video below it makes sense that it would get hot around the top near the cameras, as to put it simply that's where the guts of the phone are with the rest of the space largely occupied by the battery (as with most modern phones). If it's running at 100% load then it would make sense that it would get hot around that area, so that part seems normal.

The 10% battery usage... If the screen is on then that also makes sense. My advice would be using a car phone charger for longer drives so it doesn't drain your battery.

On 6/13/2021 at 6:39 PM, The89Lunder said:

The phone does cool down after the drive, it just seems to keep draining the battery a little faster than usual. I installed CPU meter to check, and it seems the CPU does not downclock until after a restart, all cores stay locked at 100%

(I know it is not usage, just clock speed).

I have tried closing all apps after having used Android Auto, but even after 30 minutes, all cores are still at 100%.

Restarting the phone and giving it 5 minutes, all cores are down to 20% - 30%

Any insight would be a appreciated. Thanks in advance

That seems to be the biggest issue. The app or some service it depends on still running in the background maybe? Since restarting the phone fixes it makes me think it is something running in the background.

If you just open up Android Auto without being in/near your car and close it does it still get stuck like that?

Tea-Sir · June 15, 2021

Thank you for answering @Spotty

I'll take your advice, and we can just leave the post here

The temp and battery drain during the drive is just a convenience thing, just hop in to the car and go, without relocating my phone and sticking it in the charger.

I did briefly used an iPhone and Apple CarPlay, and my iPhone never got warm or used a ton of battery while in wireless Car Play mode.

This is really the only problem I have with my entry into the Android world. But maybe the S20 FE wasn't such a good choice..., It has the Exynos CPU which I am reading a lot of bad things about.

The screen is off during my drive, so that shouldn't add to problem.

I have tried force closing the android auto app after the drive, but even after an hour, it is still pegged at 100% clock speeds. I have attached a screenshot from the app "CPU monitor"

I have tried googling for a method to figure out which service causes this problem, but it seems that is not possible on Android 10.