Every GPS tracker lives between two competing goals: collect enough location information to be useful and avoid consuming unnecessary battery. Android tries to protect the second goal, sometimes at the expense of applications that genuinely need long-running location work.
Satellite reception, sensor processing, CPU wakeups, mobile or Wi-Fi uploads and screen use can all contribute to battery consumption. The GPS receiver is only one component.
A tracker that records or uploads every few seconds will generally demand more resources than one that checks occasionally. There is no honest universal claim such as 'all phones use exactly 10% per day'.
Android introduced background location limits to reduce power use. Applications with a legitimate continuous-location purpose need to use the platform's supported mechanisms instead of trying to defeat those limits.
Manufacturers can add further sleeping-app policies, so two phones running the same Android version may behave differently.
A fleet vehicle, a hiking breadcrumb trail and occasional family check-ins do not all need identical update intervals.
Measure two things separately: whether points continue to arrive and how fast the battery falls. If points stop after screen-off, that is a reliability problem. If tracking works but consumption is too high, change intervals or settings gradually and retest.
Do not change five settings at once; you will not know which one mattered.
LocationOf can be configured for different connectivity and tracking situations. Test the current Android build on your actual handset rather than relying on old battery claims from generic device pages.
Samsung users should also read Samsung background GPS; Xiaomi users can use the HyperOS guide.
If you want to know what continuous tracking costs on your phone, measure it rather than relying on a percentage copied from another model. Charge to a known level, use the phone in a normal way for a fixed period with tracking disabled, and record the battery change. Repeat on another comparable day with tracking enabled and the same screen-use and connectivity pattern as closely as practical.
This will never be a laboratory measurement, but it gives you a much more useful personal baseline. A weak mobile signal, bright screen, navigation, camera use and hot weather can all change consumption enough to swamp the tracker itself.
If you change the recording interval, upload interval or battery restriction, repeat the test one variable at a time. The goal is to find the lightest configuration that still produces the route detail and reliability you actually need.
Battery claims copied from another handset are rarely useful. Screen time, mobile signal strength, temperature, battery age, upload frequency and navigation use can all change consumption dramatically. If tracking power use matters, measure the phone you actually intend to carry.
Start from a known charge level and use the phone normally for a fixed period without tracking. Repeat on a comparable day with tracking enabled and roughly similar screen and network use. The difference is not laboratory-grade data, but it is far more meaningful than a universal percentage advertised for every Android model.
When tuning the setup, change one variable at a time. A longer recording interval, less frequent uploading or a manufacturer battery exception may each affect power and reliability differently. If five settings change together, you will not know which change actually helped.
A lower-power configuration is only an improvement if the resulting trail is still useful. If the map stops updating after the display turns off, that is a background-execution problem rather than successful optimization. If the route remains complete but the battery falls faster than you want, then update frequency and connectivity are better places to tune.