3

I am writing a program in Android that uses GPS. It will prompt the user to turn on location services if it is not on (which I guess is equivalent to turning on gps ?). My question is: does the gps immediately start consuming extra battery power as soon as location services is turned on or it uses batter power whenever the location services is queried/used for a new location ?

Cemre Mengü
  • 18,062
  • 27
  • 111
  • 169

3 Answers3

9

The GPS starts working only when the location manager requests an update from it. Turning on the GPS in the device only allows programs to request locations if they want, but it doesn't mean the GPS is kicking in.

You can test it yourself: The GPS icon in the notification bar tells the GPS status. You can turn on the GPS, but the icon won't appear. Why? No application requests updates now. As soon as an application requests an update, the icon starts blinking (The GPS is initializing itself) and when it stops, it means the GPS is initialized and is currently receiveng updates. The GPS consumes battery only when this icon appears.

Jong
  • 9,045
  • 3
  • 34
  • 66
3

My company wrote a blog post on this subject a while back. Check to see if its useful.

http://www.littleeye.co/blog/2013/03/29/understanding-gps-resource-usage/

But we missed talking about what happens when no app is actually requesting for a location update. And yes, as mentioned unless apps actually ask for a location update, they will not cause power drain. But note that even a single request for a location update (depending on coarse or fine grained request) can have unintended effects, as the device has to go thro various states before it can get back to its steady state.

Kumar Rangarajan
  • 431
  • 2
  • 7
1

Turning on location services is just permission given by user to applications for using location services. As long as any application not asks for location, power consumption is the same as with location sesrvices turnded on. On the other hand - there is many applications trying to get location. Facebook, Camera, Android, many of ads libs, so yes - user can get battery life issues when GPS is unlocked.

piotrpo
  • 12,398
  • 7
  • 42
  • 58