Energy benchmark platform for mobile apps

Ever wondered if mobile apps are optimised for low energy consumption? Leszek Nowaczyk, a student at the Department of Computing at Imperial College in London, created Energio – a hardware-based energy benchmark platform for mobile apps, using Otii Arc and and the software add-on Otii Automation Toolbox to collect and automate the measurements.

For those of you that follow our blog and are familiar with our mission, it won’t be new when we say that energy consumption and its implications on user experience, the environment and cost are becoming more and more crucial. Which is probably still an understatement.

Especially the smartphone industry feels that pain as limited improvements in battery technology should push developers to optimize the energy efficiency of their application or device. And not only are developers and engineers very much aware of that but also a lot of users consider the energy consumption of an app when rating it. In fact, users want to understand what drains the battery of their device and how they can control it – we probably can all relate to that. 

In his project, Leszek addresses the painful subject of the clear need for an energy rating system for smartphone applications. Whilst there are already rating systems for housing, white goods or cars in place, you can’t find something similar that might allow users to be more energy sensitive when installing applications. The project gives app developers insights and tools on how to introduce a low power mindset into their everyday work. So if you are an app developer and haven’t started adapting this mindset yet, it is time!

The detailed project report can be found here or check out the short video about how Leszek made use of Energio and Otii to benchmark applications Reddit, BaconReader, RedReader and Relay for Android.