diff --git a/core/java/android/app/ActivityManager.java b/core/java/android/app/ActivityManager.java
index f398c8dc9d6a2..8fa06786252bd 100644
--- a/core/java/android/app/ActivityManager.java
+++ b/core/java/android/app/ActivityManager.java
@@ -1111,6 +1111,18 @@ public class ActivityManager {
         return RoSystemProperties.CONFIG_LOW_RAM;
     }
 
+    /**
+     * Returns true if this is a small battery device. Exactly whether a device is considered to be
+     * small battery is ultimately up to the device configuration, but currently it generally means
+     * something in the class of a device with 1000 mAh or less. This is mostly intended to be used
+     * to determine whether certain features should be altered to account for a drastically smaller
+     * battery.
+     * @hide
+     */
+    public static boolean isSmallBatteryDevice() {
+        return RoSystemProperties.CONFIG_SMALL_BATTERY;
+    }
+
     /**
      * Used by persistent processes to determine if they are running on a
      * higher-end device so should be okay using hardware drawing acceleration
diff --git a/core/java/com/android/internal/os/RoSystemProperties.java b/core/java/com/android/internal/os/RoSystemProperties.java
index 1d26df0de12cb..89a4e17aa9767 100644
--- a/core/java/com/android/internal/os/RoSystemProperties.java
+++ b/core/java/com/android/internal/os/RoSystemProperties.java
@@ -33,6 +33,8 @@ public class RoSystemProperties {
     // ------ ro.config.* -------- //
     public static final boolean CONFIG_LOW_RAM =
             SystemProperties.getBoolean("ro.config.low_ram", false);
+    public static final boolean CONFIG_SMALL_BATTERY =
+            SystemProperties.getBoolean("ro.config.small_battery", false);
 
     // ------ ro.fw.* ------------ //
     public static final boolean FW_SYSTEM_USER_SPLIT =