Not sure which country you are in but under consumer rights, if you can clearly evidence that the product is not doing what Apple claims it does then you have a right to return for a refund or replacement
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AirPods Max Severe Battery Drain
- Thread starter VL_424
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Update on my battery drain, charged them overnight on Tuesday and they were at 100% on Wednesday morning. Wednesday night when I came to use them, they were at 27%.
I charged them again last night and they were at 100% this morning, tonight, with no use, they are at 20%.
They have been in the smart case all day, NO devices within 40 miles of them that they were able to connect to, just appalling drain sat there doing nothing.
I even manually made sure that they were disconnected from all of my devices this morning before I left.
No rhyme or reason for it at all. There is something pretty wrong somewhere.
Going to reset them tonight, charge them again and see what I have in the morning and then at the end of tomorrow and see if that makes any difference.
Jason
I charged them again last night and they were at 100% this morning, tonight, with no use, they are at 20%.
They have been in the smart case all day, NO devices within 40 miles of them that they were able to connect to, just appalling drain sat there doing nothing.
I even manually made sure that they were disconnected from all of my devices this morning before I left.
No rhyme or reason for it at all. There is something pretty wrong somewhere.
Going to reset them tonight, charge them again and see what I have in the morning and then at the end of tomorrow and see if that makes any difference.
Jason
Since when did you notice this problem?
Some facts:
-People noticed this problem by the first week of use.
-We suspect that it has something to do with the firmware update process to 3C16.
- We suspect this bug is triggered sometimes when you switch the use of the AirPods Max with several apple devices (Mac, Apple TV, etc).
- Reseting solve the problem (getting drain only of 10-12% per day instead of more than 50%), but the problem can happen again.
Had them since 16th December, but only started to experience the problem on 19th January, so had a month of trouble free usage.
Only use these with iPad and iPhone, never connected them to my MBP or Apple TV’s and until Wednesday, I had never used them with my iPhone.
Jason
Even 10-12% drain a day doing nothing but sitting there seems a little excessive. For a someone who doesn't use their cans daily, you're asking for problems when you just would like to use your headphones.
Same here. I‘ve had them since 24th of December. Used them with all of my devices. Excessive battery drain started to develop around 19th or 20th of January. First, I disabled automatic switching - to no avail. Yesterday evening, I completely removed them from all my devices, made a factory reset, re-paired them, disabled auto switching and turned off all devices, they could connect to, overnight. I put the headphones in the Smart Case at 56%. This morning they are at 54%. So it seems to temporarily have solved the problem. They still can hold a charge. Let‘s see how they measure, when I come back home from work tonight.
A well regarded Mac developer (guy behind AirBuddy) has been playing with his AirPods Max and noticed that they seem to be broadcasting at a very high rate even when in the case:
I didn’t think this was due to device switching or any other things like that.
My assumption was that there was something similar to a stuck process running on the APM’s which was draining the battery.
I hadn’t got anything to test or corroborate that, but this suggests something similar.
Hopefully, a very simple firmware fix
Jason
My guess is that the APM’s are constantly searching for a device to connect to and that is causing the battery drain
I have a similar issue with my iPhone when I’m in an area with no signal, the battery takes a huge hit as it’s trying to find a signal all of the time.
I surmise that this is a similar issue, although I could be hugely wrong.
Software updates for bugs are not simple at all. What is causing the problem? What circumstances are required for the problem to occur? Which devices are affected? Why is it only affecting some users and not all? Why have I had a month of no issues, other people having issues straight away?
There is such a huge number of variables, all of which have to be investigated, then tracked down within thousands upon thousands of lines of code, corrected, tested etc. It is a massive undertaking.
I know that Apple have a huge team and have the resources available but it’s a double edged sword. They have an astronomical amount of customers and all these issues have to be looked at as a whole.
Jason
Follow-up to my own post. When I checked tonight, about 12 hours later, the AirPods Max are down another 6% at 48%. So after all the resetting and adjusting, if I extrapolate a bit, I am at a drain rate of roughly 10% per 24 hrs inside the Case. Which is OK, I guess. Better than down to zip. Hard to tell, what fixed it. My guess is the reset, breaking whichever deadly cycle the headphones were into. My firmware version is 3C16, by the way.
this makes sense . Of course it because their processor are not resting . The evidence is that the average drain per hour is 4-5% when not using them, which is the same as when listening music. Therefore, there processor get stuck and keep working the whole time.
however, there’s something that trigger this problem, and that when our hypothesis of device switching comes out.
Once you hard reset it, it solve the problem temporary, until their processor get stuck again. Not saying that the device switching is the only cause, there might be others as well, but it’s a patter we’ve seen among several users.
Apple should be the one doing this A/B testing to isolate any possible cause that triggers this problem, or just by making sure that the processor is unstuckable .
Yes. The hard reset ends that processing cycle that it was stuck. 10-12% drain per day is what we usually see. But you have to consider that that only during the first day of not use. Cause if you keep not using them (inside the case without waking them up) after 18 hours, the rate is less case the got into the ULTRA saving mode
Well, in my case, I finally had to return it yesterday.
After having them for over a month, I can say the audio quality is amazing, I love the design and how confortable to my head is.
I had this issue 3 times , solved by hard resets , but nothing guaranties at the moment that is going to be corrected, or that it’s a software bug. It could also be a defective A1 chip or other piece.
So I preferred to give it back to apple. And I’ll buy them again as soon as they have them back in stock. Hopefully this time I’m one of the people who never got a problem.
Cause this was causing me an ocd checking the battery all the time, which is not pleasurable for me.
After having them for over a month, I can say the audio quality is amazing, I love the design and how confortable to my head is.
I had this issue 3 times , solved by hard resets , but nothing guaranties at the moment that is going to be corrected, or that it’s a software bug. It could also be a defective A1 chip or other piece.
So I preferred to give it back to apple. And I’ll buy them again as soon as they have them back in stock. Hopefully this time I’m one of the people who never got a problem.
Cause this was causing me an ocd checking the battery all the time, which is not pleasurable for me.
****UPDATE****
I reset my APM’s last night after a support call to Apple (wanted to log the issue, they also suggested as many other people call them and log the problem as well)
Charged them over night, checked them this morning and they were on 100%.
Went out to work, although only for a few hours, not a full day. It is now midnight here in the UK and I have looked at the headphones for the first time today and they are at 99%
1% in an entire day is more than acceptable and adds weight to the argument that there is a stuck process or they are potentially searching for devices perhaps.
No idea really, but just wanted to let you all know what I had found. I will continue to monitor and report back
Jason
I reset my APM’s last night after a support call to Apple (wanted to log the issue, they also suggested as many other people call them and log the problem as well)
Charged them over night, checked them this morning and they were on 100%.
Went out to work, although only for a few hours, not a full day. It is now midnight here in the UK and I have looked at the headphones for the first time today and they are at 99%
1% in an entire day is more than acceptable and adds weight to the argument that there is a stuck process or they are potentially searching for devices perhaps.
No idea really, but just wanted to let you all know what I had found. I will continue to monitor and report back
Jason
Thanks for the update. Keep em coming! Let's figure this out. I've been getting 10% drain every 24 hours consistently. Only had the 100% to 1% drain once. Did a hard reset. Been getting the 10% drain since. I only get the less than 1% drain at 100%. Anything less than 100% and it's 10% per 24 hours in the case
Yeah I'm gonna keep them tho bc they function perfectly other than standby battery. My fix for now is to keep them plugged in when not in use. Fairly easy temp fix until software is addressed hopefully if not then I'll continue keeping them on the charger.
I am impressed by the kind of brand loyalty being exhibited here.
From the onset I was just put off even considering them from a pricing standpoint against what is already on the market.
But to even imagine people willing to withstand a functionality issue such as battery drain on a device like headphones is staggering.
From the onset I was just put off even considering them from a pricing standpoint against what is already on the market.
But to even imagine people willing to withstand a functionality issue such as battery drain on a device like headphones is staggering.
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Just my observations.
I could be wrong
or you are one of the unaffected
or you have a good pair
or you are the loyal ones
or maybe it doesn’t even bother you at all.
It doesn’t bother me. I don’t think 10% per day is unusable.
I think anything more drastic that some people experience will get corrected with a software update.