FI 3 (and 1) Series Unit Battery Lifetime Lifespan
I am just posting this because I couldn’t find anything on the actual Lifespan of the Units to see if mine was malfunctioning or just dying a normal battery death. When looking could only find how long the charged battery life lasts per charge for a healthy battery.
Been a FI customer since 2019.
Series 1 battery lasted 2 1/2-ish years
Series 2 - lasted 3 months. Then, the next unit 2 months. Then they came out with the series 3 and we tossed the series 2. Never buy a series 2. They almost lost our business over it. It was worse than the series 1 in every way.
Series 3- very happy with it. It is almost dead at 3 ish years. Just bought a 3+ and got it today.
The way it dies. About 6 months before it dies, you notice it “charges to 100%” and then reads 80ish% 24-48 hours later when it used to take weeks to get that low. Then it holds that charge and decreases normally. The death of the battery will be sudden after that.
After 6ish months of the above, your collar will read any percentile but still well above 50% and suddenly “go offline” and not reconnect on its own. You’ll put it on the charging base and it will do the green light as if it is resetting itself. It will then hold a charge for 3-5 days for the next week or two. Each time going offline while reading a charge percentage above 50% in the app. Manual factory resetting will not help. It makes it go green again while on the charger, but the problem persists.
Eventually it will go offline every day after less than 24 hours and only reconnect once on the charging base.
I recommend ordering your new Fi unit when it hits the 3-5 days mark. Earlier if you regularly use it to find an escaped dog. We kept ours this long because pup is 9 and we primarily use the FI app to make sure he is getting enough exercise.