Early Sony Xperia 1 III reviews reveal battery life to be a potential Achilles' heel for the US$1,299.99 phone

Numerous Sony Xperia 1 III reviews have been appearing online (expect Notebookcheck’s thorough review soon) and there have been some concerns voiced about the flagship smartphone’s battery life. While the price tag of US$1,299.99/€1,299/£1,199 has unsurprisingly been universally criticized, the battery life of the Xperia 1 III has also been picked upon for, in some cases, not even being as long-lasting as that of the Xperia 1 II predecessor.

For instance, GSMArena’s review pointed out that there is a larger 4,500-mAh battery in the 2021 Xperia 1 III compared to the 4,000-mAh battery for the Xperia 1 II but the overall endurance rating of 82h for the newer model was still below the rating of 83h for the older Xperia. The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (5,000-mAh battery) was way ahead of the Xperia 1 III here, with the talk time, web browsing, and video playback results for the Sony phone all proving to be considerably inferior.

A similar picture was painted in reviews published by PhoneArena and CNET. The former site produced better browsing test results (@60 Hz) for the Xperia 1 III over the Xperia 1 II, but the YouTube video-streaming test and 3D Gaming benchmark (@60 Hz) offered the opposite results, with the predecessor beating the 2021 successor. The YouTube test was particularly poor, with 6 h 5 m for the Xperia 1 III compared to 8 h 52 m for the Galaxy S21 Ultra and 8 h 59 m for the Xperia 1 II. CNET was unimpressed by the video playback time at 120 Hz, with the SD 888 smartphone managing 10 h 45 m.

It’s not all bad news for the Sony Xperia 1 III though – the lengthy standby time was widely praised and reviewers have been satisfied with the presence of a 30 W charger, as it seems there will be a lot of use needed for that particular accessory (although charging times recorded for the 2021 Sony flagship were not speedy). Conversely, TechRadar found the Xperia 1 III to offer decent performance in regard to its battery, and it is even mentioned as one of the device’s plus points: “great battery life”.

Buy the Sony Xperia 1 II on Amazon