Does data packet size affects current/power consumption during data transmission?

[sushil]

I am sending 13 bytes of data from my BLE application. Will the current consumption reduce after i limit that data to 4 bytes?

[Pål Håland]

Hi sushil

That depends, it is better to send most of the data in one burst compared to many small data transmissions. If those additional 9 bytes is not necessary, then you will save some power by only transmitting those 4 bytes.

(you would save ~9us transmission time at arround 16uA)

But if you transmit all those data in smaller burst, then you have a bigger overlay of data transmitted.

BR Pål

[Pål Håland]

I was actually wrong when I said 9 saved microseconds, it should be 9*8us = 72us (1us per bit). For the nRF52 you can see radio current consumption in the infocenter. Calculating it for a packet would be 10 bytes LL header, 4 bytes l2cap header, and 3 bytes ATT header. Then you can add the calculations for the remaining data bytes.