Real battery life is the amount of time a device operates on a fully charged battery.
Thermal device manufacturers sometimes list the battery life information in a bit misleading way. Up to 6 hours might mean 6 hours, or it might mean 3. For this reason, we have decided to put the thermal devices to the test ourselves. The real battery life of each device is displayed in the table below. In all tests (videos) we followed the same standard operative procedure, to ensure the same (equal) conditions for all the devices.
The devices were turned on but were not operated with while the test was ongoing, and functions such as Wi-Fi, recording, etc. were turned off. While we know this is not the way thermal devices are normally used on the field, we had to ensure all devices were tested under the same conditions to display the maximum battery life.
If you wish to learn more about how the device performed, click Read More. The article will be regularly updated with new models.
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Test procedure
Each device was fully charged before filming. We started filming the battery life with the camera first. Then we started recording with the GoPro, which was set at a time-lapse (5s intervals). Lastly, we turned the device on, and when the finger pressed the button, we started the stopwatch.
We tested each device before filming to make sure we knew how to handle it properly. In some cases, the thermal device goes into the Standby mode by itself, if it doesn't detect any movement of the press of the button after some time. We turned off that option if that was available, in other cases we had to press a certain button or slightly shake it, to prevent it.
GoPro Stand
Image Quality
Please note that the flickering and double vision are the result of filming with the GoPro, and not due to the thermal device. The primary focus was demonstrating a real battery life; therefore, the image quality was not optimal.
Temperature
Please take into consideration that the start-up time might vary at different temperatures. You can see the temperature at which this was filmed in the bottom right corner of the digital watch. The objective of this test was to see, how long the battery lasts at room temperatures, that's why we tried keeping it between 20 and 25°C.
Batteries
Each device that we tested was fully charged. The battery status can be seen on the display of thermal imagers. For the devices with generic or rechargeable insertable batteries, we always used the Panasonic brand ones. We always used fresh batteries, that came straight out of the packaging, so they were fully charged. Please note that the results might vary if you're using different batteries.
Each device has a specific requirement when it comes to the power supply, some of them can be powered by various options such as external battery packs, rechargeable batteries as well as commercially available batteries. The operation time varies based on the selected power supply, that is why we performed multiple tests on specific devices that enable different power supply options. We explained the details in separate articles, which we wrote about each device.
Panasonic Batteries
Device Settings
Each device was tested with the default settings, as it comes out of the box. For some devices, we had to make adaptations and change settings for the procedure to run smoothly. These are settings bound on automatic standby and shutdown.
Our observations
Our observations for each device are also listed (particularities when it comes to turning the device on, the buttons, batteries, etc.), which you can also find in individual blog posts posted per each device. There, you can also find all specifics in additional information about each device, such as the power supply, special functions, charging, and our overall opinions about them.
