Signal-ios: Hot phone during video calls

[kubussz]

• [x] I have searched open and closed issues for duplicates
• [x] I am submitting a bug report for existing functionality that does not work as intended
• [x] This isn't a feature request or a discussion topic

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Bug description

The phone during the call video (wifii/LTE) is very hot and the battery is quickly used up.

Steps to reproduce

• video call by LTE/3g and wifi

Actual result: The phone is very hot quickly and the battery is very quickly used up

Screenshots

Device info

Device: iphone se

iOS version: 12.1.4

Signal version: 2.37.0

[abhi6983]

I'm facing this issue as well on my iPhone Xs on iOS 12.1.4. My phone gets really hot and the battery drains rapidly when making video calls.

[mailinglists35]

I also started experiencing this

using latest beta ios

at first I assumed it was because of encrypting realtime video, but it happens even with plain audio

debug log: https://debuglogs.org/fb9c519ca85d29a0b2bc71d909be103a8cf45a0284113a5f1118017c761a3160.zip1

[mailinglists35]

@kubussz if you could edit the text of your issue, and make also the checkbox "this isn't a feature request" - I belive that should be checked as well as the first two

[mailinglists35]

iphone SE here as well

[Tursko]

Device: iPhone XS

My phone gets extremely hot and is super slow when on a Signal call or Video chat.

[poonlit]

Have same issue on my Galaxy Note8 when I'm videocalling, but the phone lasted about 50 minutes and went from 80% to 28% battery.
We were having someone on videocall for a board game. Had to switch to another device when I plugged in the charger at about 28% and the battery level kept decreasing even while charging.

The battery drained stopped when the video call was ended.

Caller Device: Samsung Galaxy Note8 (Exynos) Android 9 (patch level 1 Aug 2019). OneUI 1.0.
Called Device: iPhone
Caller device was on 4G+ LTE at first, switched to Wifi after a while which had no effect on the battery drain.

Should be easy to reproduce.
EDIT: Debug log: https://debuglogs.org/f5004e2252f2108d7bd32b130dcae99fb5dea508478981a1f99d0224bb477ed4
Video call started around 13:00 CEST and ended around 14:40 on Aug 24th. The person I called has phone number ending in *49.

[joe940]

Nothing drains my iPhone faster than a Signal video call. Ditto my friends' iPhones when we have a video call. Relatively new phones, no battery issues generally. To reproduce, make a 15-minute video call from an iPhone to another iPhone, note battery usage. Our iPhones also get very hot during video calls.

[pjoulot]

Same here with a Sony Xperia and a Samsung Galaxy S7 on Android :(

[dmindfuse]

Same issue on iPhone 11 and ios 13.7 (17H35). The call runs fine for a couple of minutes and then things deteriorate fast. It also seems to lead to connectivity and lag issues during the call. Wish this were improved. Love the app.

[kclarkr]

iPhone SE, iOS 14.0.1 and Signal 3.19.0.7 led to very warm iPhone SE and quickly draining battery.

[abhishekshah458]

Actual result:
Over heat and battery drain, camera unit gets super

hot

Expected result:
No over heat should happen

Screenshots
Cannot be recorded

Device info
Device: Asus zenphone 6

iOS version: android version 10

Signal version: 5.0.8

[cawauk]

Same issue on Huawei mate 20 pro. Brand new battery, signal drains it at 20% per hour, alone. Been happening for the last year, very frustrating, I keep having to revert to WhatsApp for long video calls.

[Bilal-io]

Same here with a Google Pixel 4a 5G
The phone runs hot very quickly and the battery drain in no time.

[ksdhir]

It seems that the app drains battery on almost all devices.
But it uses 25% of the CPU in Samsung S7 and has heating issues in iPhone 12 pro.