Is auto sync really killing my battery?

Question

I have been digging the archives for eternity to find that Location Services and Auto-sync (assuming we ignored other factors such as Bluetooth etc -- because my focus is mainly about auto sync) are extremely battery hungry.

Although, i manually toggle the switches (GPS, BT etc) based on requirement. I have paid enough heed to notice the battery gain and drain caused by auto sync enabled and disabled.

I have read somewhere people claiming innocence of autosync. Basically, Their idea is that it doesn't constantly push all the data from server to my phone and vice-versa. instead, there is a thread meant to ask the server if there's something new (and events are created based on the responses).

So, shed some light on:

1) is auto sync really causing the depression to my battery?

2) what does auto sync really do (perhaps a geeky explanation please) ?

3) how many minutes/hours am i actually gaining or losing while leaving it ON or OFF ?

4) what other factors claim culpability as to battery drain?

Answer 1

Auto sync is a process where all the data inside your phone and servers, being copy to and from each others. This will make sure that every data you have, such as phone address, photos from your camera, and could be your game progress being saved in google data centre (if your device is Android).

In case you have your device stolen, or hard brick, or whatnot, you still have all the data I mentioned safely inside the data centre, and can be restored back to your new device once you have login your Gmail. As Android 4.3-4.4, auto sync is really a battery killer, but I myself didn't experienced that anymore in Lollipop.

I turned On my auto syncs so that I can be notified any mails, or G+ notifications without need to open the app. Auto sync looks a battery killer because it's ON everytime, but the data synchronization occurs if there's changes to one of them, either on your device, or the data centre.

Answer 2

I had a battery drain issue on my Nexus 5. Overnight it went from 100% to 89% with all apps closed. Problem was Google Play Services. Deleted my GMail accounts and battery drain issue disappeared. Used Skype and battery drain issue returned. Deleted Skype account - battery drain issue resolved.