Help Battery Indicator widgets not working on Android 10

I can't say for sure if this will help you, because devices vary so greatly.

I have bad eyes as well.

Anyway, try this...

Start from your homescreen.

Swipe down from the top of the screen to bring down the Quick Settings Menu.

There will appear somewhere a Settings pinwheel.

Press and hold it for 10 seconds, or until it animates (spins).

A toast message will pop up stating that you have unlocked the System UI Tuner.

Now go back to the homescreen, and open your app drawer to find Settings.

Tap Settings, and go to System.

Toward the bottom of the System options there should be a new one, called System UI Tuner.

Tap that, and tick the switch to turn it on.

Here you might find options for what you want to appear on the status bar (the line of symbols and other info at the top of your screen).

One of these options might be to always show the battery level as a numeric percent.

I hate to keep using words like 'might' and 'maybe', but this is a portion of Android that varies so greatly between devices that it is insane.

At any rate, you can leave the System UI Tuner in the 'on' position, it won't hurt anything.

There might be even some neat tbings in there for you to check out.

Some devices even have a dark mode adjustment hidden in there.

Actually, that is how I found out about it, when looking for a device wide (global) dark theme when I got a new device a couple years ago.

@coyote2

Well, I am so glad to have helped!

At any rate, the System UI Tuner is always a crapshoot, because of inconsistancies in its functions across manufacturers, makes, models, and OS systems.

But it is always cool to see hidden settings and adjustments.

As my Android experience is currently limited to 8.1.0 and below, I was not aware of the adfitional requirements needed to unlock the System UI Tuner, so I learned something new today.

Now, maybe you can find an app similar to what you found, that is open source (FOSS, Free Open Source Software), so that you can be weened a bit from the Google Play Store.

My thoughts on this are that many such apps, while 'cool', also harbor undesireable effects.

If you start getting pop-up ads, an app like that is one of my first suspects.

There is an app that I use to check for such things, called Add-Ons Detector.

It will go through your apps and tell you what is hidden inside, and also tell you all the permissions that they have.

https://addons-detector.en.uptodown.com/android

(UpToDown is the number two appstore on Earth.)

Right here is what I am talking about...

Without even looking more than onto the permissions that the Google Playstore description of the app admits that the app has, I find this:



Now, if the only thing that this app does is make your battery measurement into a pretty display, then why on Earth does it need access to every file on your device?

Oh, and it also has full network capability as well.

Yeah, that is the kind of thing I look out for- apps that have permission to all the information on your device, and the capability to send it to God Knows Where for God Knows Why.

A perfect example as to why I stay away from apps from the Play Store.

I checked out a few, on F-Droid.
(F-Droid is an appstore of FOSS apps.)

After searching 'battery meter' and 'battery monitor' (I would have searched 'battery' next) I think I found what you originally wanted.

For free.
With no ads, no tracking, and no permissions.

BatteryBot Pro (Battery monitoring tool, "pro" version) - https://f-droid.org/app/com.darshancomputing.BatteryIndicatorPro

If you go into the settings, you can place and adjust a percentage icon in your status bar.

I realize (through my own bad eyes) that it is going to be tiny.

But you said that you like to check your battery stats as you walk by before you said that you wanted to see them from across the room.

I just leave my phones plugged in when I am using them at home.
The price of new batteries is less than the mental strain of worrying about dead batteries.
I still get 2+ years out of batteries usually.

That seems to be on par with the average lifespan, or close enough for government work.

So, perhaps a nice, long cord and a charger can be of some help here.

I get 10 ft long cords for $9 and chargers for $6 at Big Lots, iHome is the brand.

And batteries?
After shipping they are about $15.

Also, seeing as how you may have now been infected with the 'tinkering bug' (you mentioned that you had already opened the Developers Options), here is a link for F-Droid.

All the apps there are safe.
Each one is meticulosly recompiled by F-Droid staff after being submitted by developers.

They know what is in each app.

Anyway, there is a minute learning curve, and the app is set up different than Google Play Store.

But, since you figured out these other things, you should be fine.

F-Droid (The app store that respects freedom and privacy) - https://f-droid.org/app/org.fdroid.fdroid

After you get it installed, go directly into the settings.

Scroll down to Theme, and pick what you like (I like Black).

Now go through the settings and make your choices. If there is something you are not sure of, just leave it be (or ask me later).

In the settings, there is a thing called Repositories.
Since you just started, just turn them all on.

The app will begin downloading the information about the apps (not the apps themselves) onto your device. (All appstores do this.)

In the upper right hand corner is a + sign, that lets you add repositories.

I am going to post here a couple to add to the list, that you could find useful, fun, or both.

https://apt.izzysoft.de/fdroid/repo...7B6D966BE743BF0EEE49C2561B9BA39073711F628937A

https://mobileapp.bitwarden.com/fdr...CC47C561C5726E1C3ED7E686B6DB4B18BAC843A3EFE6C

The first one, IzzySoft, will add many more cool apps to the ones that are already there.
I have found that many of the apps that I use come from IzzySoft.

The other one is for the open source version of Bitwarden, an excellent password manager.

Yes, you can find some- if not many- of these apps elsewhere, even on the Play Store itself.

But the apps on the Play Store are almost always infected with analytics (spyware) and other trash- even ads sometimes.

You can even find blatant copy-cat apps from unscruptulous developers that just take a open source app from F-Droid, insert ads into it, and post it onto the Play Store.

Sure, Google claims that this violates their Terms Of Service, but they rarely do anything about it.

Even if they do, all that happens is that the developer gets the app pulled from the store, and needs to pay another $25 fee to post more apps.

So it is much better to just get the apps from a source that you know isn't like Google.

Damn, I did wind up turning this into an anti-Google rant after all, hahaha.

sorry / not sorry

hahaha