A GPS tracker that lasts two weeks between each recharge might be great for a daily driver you check every day but would be useless for protecting a classic car that sits for months between outings. Its important to understand the factors affecting battery life and the context of battery life claims before looking at rechargeable trackers.
Reporting Frequency
You will often see claims like “6 months battery life” alongside “real-time tracking”. Both claims can be true for the same device, just never at the same time. Depending on how often they send position updates, two identical devices with the same battery will see very different results for example:
- 1-minute tracking (a fix and report every 60 seconds) typically gives you less than 7 days on a typical sized tracker.
- Once or twice-daily check-ins can stretch that exact same hardware to 12 months.
The good news about update frequency is that it’s adjustable. If your device isn’t lasting as long as you’d like, let us know and we will adjust its reporting frequency to improve the battery life.
Why nobody can promise an exact battery life
Anyone who gives you a precise runtime figure is guessing, because too many variables feed into it. The honest answer is a range, and the range depends on:
- Update frequency — by far the biggest factor. Going from updating every couple of seconds to once every hour can multiply lifespan hundreds of times, nothing else you change comes close to this.
- GPS signal quality. City buildings, multi-storey car parks and even dense tree cover all make the GPS module work harder and longer for each fix, burning more power every update.
- Cellular coverage. A weak signal to the mobile network forces the modem to transmit at higher power. With rural NZ coverage, that can add up quickly.
- Temperature. Extreme cold can cut usable lithium-ion capacity by 20% or more. A tracker that lasts a month in summer may fall well short of that through a South Island winter.
- Physical placement. Being placed inside a metal chassis or under a steel trailer frame affects both GPS and cellular signals pushing the device to work harder for each report.
This is also why modern trackers lean heavily on accelerometers and smart modes. When the device detects it’s been stationary for a while, it drops into deep sleep using minimal power and only wakes when it senses motion or hits a scheduled timer. A parked car contributes almost nothing to battery drain; the meter only really runs when the vehicle is moving.
Decoding battery life claims
When looking at rechargeable trackers the battery life claims vary wildly, and out of context they can be misleading. Consider the below when comparing different trackers on the shelf.
mAh is the tank size, not the mileage. A bigger battery rating looks reassuring, but capacity only tells you how much energy is stored — not how efficiently the device uses it. A poorly designed tracker with a huge cell can easily be outlasted by a well-engineered one with a smaller battery. Bigger mAh isn’t automatically better.
“Six months battery life” almost always means standby. That kind of figure is typically calculated with the device in low-power mode sending a single report a day — not actively tracking. The trouble is you’ll often see that claim sitting right beside a “real-time updates” claim, with no mention that it’s one or the other, not both. Consider every long-life battery claim for standby mode only unless told otherwise.
For vehicles, consider skipping the battery entirely
An OBD-II tracker draws its power directly from the vehicle so it never needs recharging. For vehicles they are unbeatable on convenience as they plug straight into the existing diagnostic port, which means no wiring or installation. If someone unplugs it, the device sends an alert and a small onboard backup battery keeps it tracking even after it’s removed.
For battery life info on our own rechargeable devices go to a device product page and click for the ‘learn more‘ link in the battery life specification. Be sure to check out all our devices here.
