Will Google's 'Battery Health Assistant' Throttle Your Pixel 10's Battery? (androidauthority.com) 55
"Google has confirmed that its Battery Health Assistance feature can't be turned off on the Pixel 10 phones," reports Android Authority:
Google introduced a Battery Health Assistance feature on the Pixel 9a earlier this year. This feature gradually drops your phone's charging speed and battery voltage in the name of battery health. This tool is mandatory on the Pixel 9a but optional on other Pixel phones. However, there's bad news for the Pixel 10 series. Google confirmed to Android Authority that Battery Health Assistance is mandatory on the Pixel 10 series and can't be disabled. That means your phone's charging speed and effective battery life will drop over time...
All smartphone batteries degrade over time, resulting in shorter and shorter endurance. Google says the Pixel 8a and newer Pixel phones can withstand 1,000 charging cycles before their batteries drop down to 80% effective capacity. However, this Battery Health Assistance feature essentially reduces the phone's battery capacity over and above standard degradation. This is particularly disappointing as users aren't given a choice in the matter.
It's also disappointing as some rival smartphone makers address battery health concerns by offering more durable batteries. For example, Samsung's top phones can withstand 2,000 charging cycles before dropping down to 80% effective capacity, while OnePlus and OPPO's lithium-ion batteries offer 1,600 cycles before reaching 80% capacity. So there likely wouldn't be a need for a Battery Health Assistance tool if Google's batteries had similar longevity.
"The issue also comes after several older Pixel A series models suffered from major battery issues in 2025..."
All smartphone batteries degrade over time, resulting in shorter and shorter endurance. Google says the Pixel 8a and newer Pixel phones can withstand 1,000 charging cycles before their batteries drop down to 80% effective capacity. However, this Battery Health Assistance feature essentially reduces the phone's battery capacity over and above standard degradation. This is particularly disappointing as users aren't given a choice in the matter.
It's also disappointing as some rival smartphone makers address battery health concerns by offering more durable batteries. For example, Samsung's top phones can withstand 2,000 charging cycles before dropping down to 80% effective capacity, while OnePlus and OPPO's lithium-ion batteries offer 1,600 cycles before reaching 80% capacity. So there likely wouldn't be a need for a Battery Health Assistance tool if Google's batteries had similar longevity.
"The issue also comes after several older Pixel A series models suffered from major battery issues in 2025..."
what about an battery door on the phone? (Score:3)
what about an battery door on the phone?
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Why? It's not like it's hard to replace the battery on a pixel. You just walk into a shop, sit down, and then walk out of a shop with a new battery. I take it you didn't replace the head gasket of your car yourself, why are you okay with paying someone to do that but freak out at the idea of parting with $20 to keep a local repair store in business? Do you have something against that local shop?
My local supermarket has 3 *THREE* separate shops that will replace batteries for you, one is comically right in f
Re: what about an battery door on the phone? (Score:3)
As for your car analogy, you even pointed out that at least repairing the car was user possible, but then turned around and declared that if this one thing in a car wasn't replaced by the user than someone shouldn't be easily able to repair ANYthing as simple as a battery in a phone. These aren't the same, and is laughable that you are trying to equate them. You know what happened when my ca
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This assumes you live in a major city that has access to the parts. My nearest store is about an hour and a half away.
It does not. Again the skills aren't hard, you can find someone in a small country town armed with an ifixit video to do this for you. Sure you won't have 3 commercial enterprises in one shopping centre offering it for you but a bit of glue is not in any way shape or form an insurmountable barrier to replacing a battery.
There's literally not a device on the market with a non-user replaceable battery. And better still there are devices with battery covers to allow replacing without opening the device. If tha
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It might take you 15 minutes, or even an hour, to replace the battery in a modern cell phone, if you've never done it. Someone with a bit of experience will take more like 5 to ten minutes.
To continue the car analogy, brake pads need to be replaced considerably more often than cell phone batteries. On most cars that's an hourish job for someone good at it and multiple hours for someone doing it their first time.
Re: what about an battery door on the phone? (Score:4, Funny)
I've replaced plenty of headgaskets during my years of driving hydrocarbon based vehicles. Mostly SAABs including 2 cycle engines.
Perhaps a closer analogy would be replacing fuel tanks. You can have a fuel tank that bolts easily to the bottom of the vehicle or you could have one deeper within the body of the vehicle that isn't so easy to replace. I've replaced the easy ones but not the hard ones.
[Would the Samsung Note 7 be the Ford Pinto of phones if the latter analogy is used?]
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I've replaced plenty of headgaskets during my years of driving hydrocarbon based vehicles. Mostly SAABs including 2 cycle engines. Perhaps a closer analogy would be replacing fuel tanks.
No the car analogy is just fine. You are in a minority of people who replace your own head gasket. I am in a minority of people who replaced my own mobile phone battery. It's something that requires skill and some tools, which none the less a service industry exists for people who don't want to do can adopt along with a wealth of information online for those who want to do it.
I dare say this is one of the best car analogies ever posted on Slashdot. No need for your fuel tank.
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Why? It's not like it's hard to replace the battery on a pixel. You just walk into a shop, sit down, and then walk out of a shop with a new battery.
You left out the step where you pay them $100 to do it.
I take it you didn't replace the head gasket of your car yourself,
Maybe compare it to something comparable, like replacing the battery in your car. Changing the head gasket is more like changing the motherboard in your phone.
why are you okay with paying someone to do that but freak out at the idea of parting with $20
You're about two orders of magnitude short for replacing the head gasket on your car. The average difference between doing it yourself and having a shop do it [ifixit.com] is about $85. And that's the current design, where you have to buy special tools to do it yourself. Make it a truly replaceable battery, an
Re: what about an battery door on the phone? (Score:2)
I do understand that everyone's needs in a phone may be different. But why should we pay any attention to yours when it makes no reference to the typical target user? Just because you're not the consumer the product works for doesn't make the business of supplying it to that consumer "abusive
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I guess I don't understand why, if $100 is such a big deal, you wouldn't just spend a few bucks on an external battery and dig into your drawer of otherwise-unused cables and spread them around your car, computer, etc.
In what way would that address a battery that has become a fire hazard because it's swelling? Enquiring minds want to know.
At least try to participate in the same conversation as everyone else.
Re: what about an battery door on the phone? (Score:2)
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You left out the step where you pay them $100 to do it.
No I didn't, read my post. It doesn't cost near $100 to do that in Europe and things in the USA are cheaper. If you paid $100 in the USA it would include first party battery, an expense you can't get away from having a little flap to do it yourself.
Maybe compare it to something comparable
How is it not comparable? It's a maintenance activity that few people do, that requires special tools (car batteries don't), it requires some skill and knowledge, it has a service industry built around it to enable people to pay others to do it, and if you really
Re:what about an battery door on the phone? (Score:4, Insightful)
And yet people don't feel the need to take their TV remote to a shop in the mall to pay to swap out the two AAA batteries in the back because you can open it with your thumb and swap them out in seconds.
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And yet people don't feel the need to take their TV remote to a shop in the mall to pay to swap out the two AAA batteries in the back because you can open it with your thumb and swap them out in seconds.
My TV remote has no user replacable batteries. If the TV remote battery (which charges via USB or via the solar panel on the back) dies I'm going to take it to the same repair store.
You analogy is out of date.
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You analogy is out of date.
Maybe your TV manufacturer just sucks. Mine does too (It's an LG and WebOS is trash) but they don't suck so badly that they denied me a battery door on my TV remote.
Are you really going to take your TV remote in for battery replacement when it's trivial? There's good odds they won't have a battery for it in stock at your local phone repair place, or if they do have one which will fit, it'll be lower capacity and then it will die again sooner. Seems like it makes sense for a person who knows what they're doi
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Or maybe the reality is that a lithium cell used for something as simple as a TV remote with a trickle charge can be comfortably expected to last a decade without any kind of maintenance what so ever. Let me guess, you still change the oil on your car every 5000miles like it's the 1970s as well?
My TV manufacturer is perfectly fine, and the point stands. Sometime in 10 years I am going to spend 15min at a repair shop. Whoop de fucking do. At least I just need to take the remote and not dig out the vacuum tu
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Why?
Why not?
Really, phones used to have covers that came open easily, and batteries that popped easily in and out. Even inexpensive Moto's had them.
That wasn't hard either ... except I guess on companies who want to sell you a whole new phone when your battery goes wonky.
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... and SD Card slots, so you could add 256 GB for $20 instead of paying $100 for an additional 128 GB from the manufacturer.
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Design choices. Phones used to be big, phones used to die when they get rained on (or had at best IP55 protection). You can of course get waterproof slim phones today with removable batteries but then you look at their battery capacity and their results are a fraction of the capacity of sealed devices.
The world is a collection of tradeoffs, and different companies provide different options for you. Not every device needs to meet *YOUR* criteria. Some of them may meet *MY* criteria instead. And I couldn't ca
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Such a kit exists in the form of battery covers. If you like your phones thicc then by all means go for it. I'm not in a situation where I need multiple batteries where I can't also plan ahead to bring a portable charger with me for those very odd occasions (and incidentally my charger is on charge now since I'm going camping on an island on the weekend, but it took me a while to find it since I've not used it in the past year).
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I once replaced the head gasket in the middle of a trip in the middle of the night, thanks to a cooperative gas station and chevy dealer.
However, I wonder who keeps a phone long enough these days for it to matter?
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My iPhone 7 lasted almost exactly 8 years. I changed the battery somewhere in the middle of its life.
My current car is a couple years younger. No head gasket problems, but brake pads and rotors at regular intervals, and new spark plugs and a battery are on the to do list for this fall. The car battery is maybe slightly faster than the phone, but phone battery changes are quicker than any of the other jobs. They're quicker than oil and filter changes (and generally cheaper) too.
I had to replace a fuel line o
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I once replaced the head gasket in the middle of a trip in the middle of the night, thanks to a cooperative gas station and chevy dealer.
However, I wonder who keeps a phone long enough these days for it to matter?
I've replaced batteries on my phones. The question of keeping the phone is silly, there's enough people who keep phones long enough that the repair industry which services them exists.
But the head gasket was a good example no? Clearly it's possible to do, just as it is possible to replace batteries yourself with a tiny bit of skill, knowledge, and someone who will either sell or lend you tools.
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One of the reasons for not upgrading this year is that in the next year or two the EU rules on replaceable batteries should kick in.
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The real problem is modern lithium polymer (Score:2)
This chemistry is unstable, unreliable, and outright dangerous. We need to switch to sodium ion or solid state batteries AS
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Sodium ion means the batter has to be 2-4 times as large to carry the same amount of energy.
Solid state lithium, however, is superior in almost every way (and coming soon).
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And has been "coming soon" for at least a decade.
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Toyota has been testing within the last year. GM has, too. The hard part has been designing factories to mass produce them, not the technology itself. And some of the companies working on it are pretty good at working out industrial processes.
But hey, something of the sort that usually takes a decade or more to bring to market taking a decade to bring to market is obviously a failure, and we should all kill ourselves in shame, eh?
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You remind me of the guy here on slashdot who was posting links to them being sold a few years ago.
But you have strong faith, and that is all you need. You believe.
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You remind me of the sort of pathetic loser who masturbates furiously while posting shit on the internet. Perhaps because that's what you are?
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That was weirdly specific. More projection?
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Do you also protest that nuclear fusion for power generation is "coming soon" and that it's wrong to point out that most people have a rather nearer-term definition of "coming soon" because fusion has some of the world's leading scientists working on it?
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Nobody's testing prototypes of power producing fusion plants.
You do know the difference between testing a prototype in the real world and writing stock-selling hype over experiments that aren't even intended to produce usable technology, don't you? Or do you?
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What, are you asking about things like Zap Energy's prototype fusion reactor [interestin...eering.com]? Or Helion's commercial plant under construction [kpq.com]? (I don't think either of those, or CFS's plant Virginia, or Type One's stellarator, or various others, will be commercial successes. Just like Toyota testing something doesn't mean they are close to having a viable Na-ion battery.)
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Did you remember to say "hail Obama" ten times while facing toward UN building in NYC before formulating this hilarious self-own?
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For me personally 2 times larger would be fine. Modern phones are too thin anyway.
Well, don't buy a Pixel.... (Score:1)
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Told my wife not to get one, but daughter talked her into it and wife changed from iPhone. And wife has issues figuring how to get stuff to work and other issues. Ask me for help, told her she's on her on. lol
Did she tell you the same thing when you asked for sex?
God Damn it Apple (Score:2)
Yet again Apple is caught red handed forcing people to buy new phones by throttling performance. Oh, wait. Apple doesn't do that. Google does. Well it's OK then.
Two words: (Score:2)
Engineered obsolescence.
Re: Two words: (Score:1)
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Engineered obsolescence.
Yeah a feature which *checks notes* is designed to extend the life of the device is engineered obsolescence. Wait... that can't be right. Did a quantum state just flip somewhere or were your fingers typing your post faster than your brain reading the summary?
The "planned obsolescence" software .. (Score:2)
... will slowly make your phone unusable. What did you expect?
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As opposed to doing nothing making your phone unusable sooner thanks to destroying the battery? A feature you can toggle off if you want?
Consider a bit more thinking and less typing.
Just turn it off (Score:1)
Pixel 4a (Score:2)
I still have a Pixel 4a that I have to charge every third day. I have not noticed any particular battery degradation. Perhaps that is because I never let my battery fully discharge? (actually, I never let it go below 30%)
There is no way in hell I would run a planned obsolescence feature willingly on any of my devices.
(yes, I know batteries CAN degrade, but they do not all degrade the same way)