Taking a look at the GSM Galaxy Nexus extended battery
The international version of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus ships with an ample 1750 mAh battery, which provides decent battery life while maintaining the phone's low profile. As we said in our review, most people shouldn't have any trouble getting through a full day of use with the stock battery.
However, sometimes you just need a little more juice, and that's where Samsung's official extended battery for the GSM Galaxy Nexus comes in. It's a larger 2000 mAh battery pack which gives you a few more hours of use in exchange for a little extra bulk. To clarify, this is different to the 2100 mAh extended battery for Verizon Galaxy Nexus owners -- the Verizon and GSM models use different batteries.
Before we begin, a couple of things to note -- firstly, this is an official Samsung extended battery, as you might've guessed by the logos on the back of the battery door. Secondly, the only way to get hold of this battery, for now, is to import it from South Korea. We hope we'll see broader international availability in the future.
The GSM extended battery comes with a larger battery door to accommodate its slightly thicker size, as you'll see in the animation below. This means the phone isn't as ridiculously thin as with the stock battery, but we found that the slightly raised bulge around the back of the phone actually made it easier to hold. That's a matter of personal preference, though, and you certainly won't notice the extra couple of millimeters when it's in your pocket. Also, even with the extra bulk around the back, the phone manage to fit its way into the couple of protective cases we tried, including the Case-Mate Barely There case, and the Qmadix Snap-on Cover with Holster.
View a larger version of this animation
The new battery door is built to the same high standards as the one in the box. Same "hyperskin" texture, same logos. The battery itself contains an NFC antenna, just like the original, and we confirmed that NFC was indeed functional with the extended battery installed.
So how about performance? Well, we've been using the 2000 mAh extended battery for around 36 hours, and in that time we've noticed it gives us around 4 to 5 extra hours with moderate-to-high usage. On a less scientific level, we've noticed that it just seems to hold charge better. We've included a few battery usage screenshots after the jump, and given the performance we've seen out of the extended battery so far, we think we'd be hard pushed to run this thing down in under a day.
As ever, we'll keep you posted with further impressions as we spend more time with the new battery. We've got a couple of screenshots and some more photos after the jump.
Reader comments
Samsung Galaxy Nexus extended battery (GSM) - a photo tour
can we get a link to buy? only on eBay?
is it possible for you to post the history details of the battery use? granted i have the verizon LTE galaxy nexus with its extended battery, but i feel like with what i consider moderate to high use of the phone, there's no way i would have 65% left over after 17 hours of use. i just wanted to see what the scree on time was in comparison to awake times and stuff. but damn that's some great battery life! i wish i was getting similar use!
I beg to differ regarding the same hyperskin texture on both battery doors. The non-extended ones are slightly grippier, due to the texture being carved deeper. I bought mine from Gmarket Korea, another guy who bought from eBay confirmed the same thing I noticed.
I get 10 hours of battery life, 4 hours of which are spent with the screen on, wi-fi is always connected and brightness is at 50%. As a comparison, I only managed to squeeze in a maximum of 3 hours of screen use on the normal battery.
Edit: I also want to add that my normal battery door is creaky just below the camera, the extended one however is creak-free.
For everybody asking, here's where we got ours: http://www.ebay.com/itm/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=120832462058&ssPageName=ADME:L:OC:US:1123
thanks Phil!
Does the door with the Google logo fit on the Verizon phone with the 2100 mAH battery?
Does anyjuan have a Google door?
"anyjuan" jajaja!
do you guys have the gsm car dock to see if it remains a tight fit in that?
there is a video of a VZW G-Nex with extended battery in the car mount. IMO it looks like a slight bulge in the center in the landscape angle. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NR-J4LbNX4s
How did he manage to get Android OS to use up more battery then the Screen?
I'm pretty sure the battery has no effect on this but I'm intrigued on how the phone was used to achieve that.
I don't think I've seen this happen on my phone yet.
Seeing this I would tend to think this was with the phone hardly being used at all. I receive similar stats on my LTE Nexus after I wake up in the morning after sleeping the night before. The Android OS is always higher than the screen usage.
I was mesmerized by the pulsing picture of the side view. Great way to illustrate the profile difference.
With my European Samsung Galaxy S2, I moved from the supplied 1650mAh battery to a 2000mAh unit (which looks identical to the above). The extended back adds about 2mm in thickness, matching the bump at the base of the phone.
Once this was conditioned, I found it very effective; delivering around 48 hours on a charge - on fairly light duty. It seems to deliver more EMF right through to the end of the charge cycle than the 1650mAh did.
"On a less scientific level.." as if the previous level was at all scientific to begin with.
What's the difference in weight?
Negligable.
Very impressive how low profile it is
i just bought it with some eBay bucks. The difference in thickness seems negligible. Almost makes the GSM Nexus similar to the Verizon version.
On its second charge today ans running great. Managed the work day at half battery, admittedly i was busy ;-)
Sorry for the up, but was trolling around looking at battery doors (stupid camera bezel is scratched, damn shame this won't fix my issues).
Any word on how it plays with the desktop dock? it's not too much, but I'd still prefer not to drop $36 on a battery that I can't put into my desktop dock...