The Samsung Galaxy S III has a powerful quad-core processor, a titantic 4.8” Super AMOLED display and a host of always-on software features. Surely it’s going to be a battery hog, right? It turns out that may not be the case, according to testing done by the fine folks at GSMArena. Let’s have a look at how the Galaxy S III fares in three tests – 3G talk time, web browsing and video playback.
The 3G talk test was the first one presented. It’s a simple test – a 3G call is maintained with the phone screen switched off. Here, the Galaxy S III made a surprisingly high mark – a massive 10 hours and 20 minutes of talk time. That compares very favourably compared to other leading phones on the market, particularly given the smaller sizes and lower powered processors of these challengers. The HTC One S got 9:42 in the same test, the Nokia Lumia 710 got 9:05. The iPhone 4S got only 7:41. That speaks to the efficiency inherent in the 32 nm processor architecture used in the S3.
How does the Galaxy S III do when that screen is turned on, though? In the web browsing test, we’d expect a lot worse results, particularly given how poorly Super AMOLED screens do on primarily white backgrounds that are so common on the web. True to form, the Galaxy S III does a bit worse here, coming in the middle of the pack with a time of 5 hours and 17 minutes. That’s worse than the iPhone 4S (6:56), but better than the previous Galaxy S II (4:24).
The last test is perhaps the most important: video playback. Here, a movie is looped for hours on end, testing the display and sound as well as the underlying OS. Here, the Galaxy S III comes up big with a whopping 10 hours and 1 minute of life – more than the iPhone 4S (9:24) and the One S (9:28), and much better than the Galaxy S II (8:00).
All in all, it looks like that combination of the 32 nm architecture and massive 2100 mAh Galaxy S III battery have more than offset the powerful processor and large 4.8” display. It’s an encouraging sign for the Galaxy S III, and should definitely mean that you won’t have to reach for your Samsung Galaxy S III charger for a while! With the potential for swapping batteries and wireless charging on top, the S III could be one of the most long-lasting smartphones around.
May 18th, 2012 → 2:59 pm @ William Judd
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