iPhone Apple throttled my iPhone 7 by 50%

[daijholt]

So a battery at 80% of its original capacity merits cpu throttling under iOS 11? Why was this unnecessary for earlier iOS versions? A battery will degrade slightly with every cycle, but for it to cause system shutdowns at 80% seems a bit wrong. I might be wrong. Might be worthwhile to visit http://batteryuniversity.com . Perhaps they have some relevant information.

I’m not entirely sure as to when a battery should begin to exhibit the issues to be honest, I’m no expert in lithium-ion so I’m sure there’s plenty of caveats to how they degrade that affects this issue.

All I’ll say is that apples fix shouldn’t activate unless your battery meets certain conditions, so if you’ve still got 80% capacity left but are getting throttled then there must be something else that contributes to it, which obviously would need a bit more research as you say.

 

[DeepIn2U]

Not affected here. Yet I've had my iPhone 7 less than a year.

Since 11.2 Apple decided to throttle my iPhone 7 by 50%. I’m seriously pi**ed. My iPhone is only slightly over one year old. This is totally unacceptable. Anyone else experiencing this with their iPhone 7s? What can I do?

iOS 11.2.1 result below

View attachment 743140


iOS 11.0.3 result below

View attachment 743139

How is it possible both your screenshots exactly a year apart have exactly 94% BATTERY charge?

Other than geekbence where are you noticing performance issues? Have you dropped your device at all?

I’m curious if performance goes back to normal based on normal application use?

 

[daijholt]

I’m not entirely sure as to when a battery should begin to exhibit the issues to be honest, I’m no expert in lithium-ion so I’m sure there’s plenty of caveats to how they degrade that affects this issue.

All I’ll say is that apples fix shouldn’t activate unless your battery meets certain conditions, so if you’ve still got 80% capacity left but are getting throttled then there must be something else that contributes to it, which obviously would need a bit more research as you say.

Been doing some research, and apparently, as batteries degrade their max capacity shrinks, along with their ability to transfer the current they produce. Like arteries that can't push blood around the body as well as they could when they were younger. That's probably what apple meant when they said "peak current" in their statement.

 

[imagineadam]

It’s unfortunately 85% with 725 cycles. I’ve read that they only replace batteries for free that are 80% or below and under 500 cycles. So I guess I’m out of luck. I just can’t accept that my 1 year old phone runs slower than a new iPhone 5s :/

It really feels that much slower all the time even doing just basic app opening and safari browsing? Like you really notice it and feel it?

 

[pgoelz]

Been doing some research, and apparently, as batteries degrade their max capacity shrinks, along with their ability to transfer the current they produce. Like arteries that can't push blood around the body as well as they could when they were younger. That's probably what apple meant when they said "peak current" in their statement.

What happens is that the internal resistance of a lithium cell increases as the cell degrades. With more resistance in the circuit, as the phone tries to draw more current, the cell voltage will drop. This gets more pronounced as the cell degrades. If as the result of elevated internal resistance the cell voltage momentarily drops below some critical point the phone could shut down or the CPU could do unpredictable things.... it depends on how the phone handles momentary voltage dips.

In my experience with lithium cells in RC models, a cell that has degraded to 80% of design capacity is still pretty healthy with a reasonable internal resistance so Apple's 80% threshold (if true) would seem to be excessively conservative.

All this merely reinforces my wish that the cellphone industry would return to the good old days of USER REPLACEABLE BATTERIES. Especially Apple, which supports phones longer than the commonly accepted two year "design cycle". But I also understand the money they make as people discard perfectly good two year old phones just to have the next wonderful thing. And yes, I am aware that with a small amount of effort I can replace the battery in my SE. Not so much with some of the other phones.

A very desirable feature would be the ability to change the full charge and fully discharged points if the user wanted longer battery service life at the expense of shorter run times. This is common in electric vehicles and would be a good thing in phones.... have an option that (for example) adjusted the battery gauge and charger so that the battery cycles between (say) 20% and 80% instead of 0% and 100%. Everything (charging, discharging, heat, time) degrades a lithium cell but time spent near 0% and 100% is especially damaging and this change to will dramatically extend their life. Some laptops have this ability, why not phones?

Paul

 

[Miss_Mac]

Haven't upgraded to 11.2 and probably will not do so.

I barely use my 7+ (lasts for at least 2.5 days before I have to charge, if not more than that.)

No throttling yet.

 

[Kmart9419]

Not bad, you got your feature early. Nice of apple to not wait for iso 12.

 

[C DM]

Not affected here. Yet I've had my iPhone 7 less than a year.



How is it possible both your screenshots exactly a year apart have exactly 94% BATTERY charge?

Other than geekbence where are you noticing performance issues? Have you dropped your device at all?

I’m curious if performance goes back to normal based on normal application use?

Seems like the screenshots are of two benchmarks a couple of months apart--the screenshots were taken at the same time simply going though the saved history of results with one selected in one screenshot and the second in the other.

 

[big samm]

no slowdowns yet either

 

[DeepIn2U]

All this merely reinforces my wish that the cellphone industry would return to the good old days of USER REPLACEABLE BATTERIES. Especially Apple, which supports phones longer than the commonly accepted two year "design cycle".
Paul

Hey there. While I fully agree Apple should replace degraded batteries of their phones under warranty, as well as offer, at a cost to the end user, replacement batteries for their phones no longer under warranty for say an extended period of time equal to the iOS supported length of time.

However there was NOTHING a good in the old days of end user replaceable batteries:

Thrown away depleted batteries, not properly recycled!
Horrible phone designs,
Phones that don’t support Dust and Water resistance - Yes Sony Ericsson he teo phones that did but not at an IP67/68 rating. These actually where pre-Android, non Symbian UIQ phones but their internal J2ME based OS phones.
OS was supported on phones for 1-yr and yet Batteries had a 90 day warranty (purchased alone or that came with phones). This was prior to 2007 and VERY commonplace!

End user battery replacement in phones will add bulk.
End user batteries will most likely drop extended warranty support for batteries.
Batteries will effectively increase landfills unless companies and end users adhere to more strict recycle policies.

So my conclusion is I’d rather internal batteries to stay, advance significantly yet remain commonplace in our phones because the warranty, battery management and any escapism excuse that the end user tampered or used a non official battery is lessens significantly as well as ownership for the end user safety remains in the direct responsibility of the manufacturer that makes the phones and the batteries!!

Cheers

 

[doxielover]

Should I stay on 10.3.3 on my 6s plus? I thought they started slowing phones on 10.2.1?

 

[thadoggfather]

Should I stay on 10.3.3 on my 6s plus? I thought they started slowing phones on 10.2.1?

They did

But throttle coupled with iOS 11 unoptimizatoons, could get uglier. Can’t say

 

[everythingapplerainbow]

does this sh*t also happen to iPad?

 

[Infrared]

The throttling has nothing to do with battery life, its to do with current. When the battery begins to degrade, it becomes incapable of supplying the same level of current as it can when its new, meaning the processor won't get enough juice to function while under load, and thus the whole system shuts down to prevent irreversible damage to the components.

My ancient 5S with its coffin-ready battery isn’t shutting down unexpectedly. Nor is it being throttled, apparently. Is there something about the 7 that means it’s particularly delicate?

 

[Wildkraut]

does this sh*t also happen to iPad?

Could be, we don’t know yet.

 

[imagineadam]

My ancient 5S with its coffin-ready battery isn’t shutting down unexpectedly. Nor is it being throttled, apparently. Is there something about the 7 that means it’s particularly delicate?

It could it be that newer processors probably can draw more and more power causing the huge drops in voltage causing the shutdowns.

 

[yansun]

The throttling has nothing to do with battery life, its to do with current. When the battery begins to degrade, it becomes incapable of supplying the same level of current as it can when its new, meaning the processor won't get enough juice to function while under load, and thus the whole system shuts down to prevent irreversible damage to the components.

Anyone who's ever overclocked their own PC will understand the concept. Unfortunately, most regular people won't have experienced this, and whilst I can understand their frustration when all they see is "my phone is slower", most aren't understanding the simple science behind it.

You can have a phone that runs slower, but still runs, or a phone that powers off every time you open a heavy app because the CPU isn't getting enough power to function. Cant have it both ways.

But then the question you have to ask is, if it is reasonable to let the cpu run on a speed in the first place that the battery cannot handle anymore after just 1-2 years / to use a battery in the first place that cannot handle the cpu speed anymore after just 1-2 years, so you have to throttle the cpu. What brings us to the question if you can speak of a design flaw here?

 

[Phonephreak]

Currently running 11.2.5 beta 2, but I’m seeing the opposite on my almost exactly 1 year old 7 Plus. I’m getting about 500 points higher than the average 7 Plus according to Geekbench.

7+ isn’t affected. Same with 6+and 6s+

 

[Jmgilliam18]

7+ isn’t affected. Same with 6+and 6s+

So the 7+ is safe to upgrade to 11.2 ? I'm on 10.3.3 still and have been putting it off.

 

[imagineadam]

So the 7+ is safe to upgrade to 11.2 ? I'm on 10.3.3 still and have been putting it off.

Sure it's safe if you want to slightly slow down your iPhone and make your home button have a delay and possibly have it be throttled if your battery isn't up to apples par. 11.2 introduced their "feature" to smooth power spikes to the iPhone 7 to avoid shutdowns just like they introduced it back on iOS 10.2.1 for the 6 and 6S last year.

I'm still on 10.3.3 on my 7 and haven't budged yet. Still waiting to see what 11.3 will bring. 10.3.3 is still the best firmware for the 7 and 7+ by far for performance, stability and battery life.

 

[simonmet]

Unfortunately, these pictures of Geekbench results can’t be considered rock-solid proof because they can be faked by running the test in low-power mode then turning off low-power mode for the results screen.

I just did this. Here are my normal and faked results:

 

[C DM]

Sure it's safe if you want to slightly slow down your iPhone and make your home button have a delay and possibly have it be throttled if your battery isn't up to apples par. 11.2 introduced their "feature" to smooth power spikes to the iPhone 7 to avoid shutdowns just like they introduced it back on iOS 10.2.1 for the 6 and 6S last year.

I'm still on 10.3.3 on my 7 and haven't budged yet. Still waiting to see what 11.3 will bring. 10.3.3 is still the best firmware for the 7 and 7+ by far for performance, stability and battery life.

One thing to keep in mind is that it doesn't mean the devices suddenly start experiencing this simply when they are running those iOS versions (or later).

 

[Phonephreak]

So the 7+ is safe to upgrade to 11.2 ? I'm on 10.3.3 still and have been putting it off.

I’m pretty sure it’s only the 6,6s,7. Not the plus sizes. They have larger batteries
[doublepost=1514288930][/doublepost]

Unfortunately, these pictures of Geekbench results can’t be considered rock-solid proof because they can be faked by running the test in low-power mode then turning off low-power mode for the results screen.

I just did this. Here are my normal and faked results:

. So we should believe you.

 

[imagineadam]

One thing to keep in mind is that it doesn't mean the devices suddenly start experiencing this simply when they are running those iOS versions (or later).

They only would suddenly start experiencing the slowdown instantly if they happened to have a bad battery jumping from iOS 10 to 11.2.

How's your 7 doing? Wouldn't you agree that overall even with a good battery it's slightly slower on 11 than its original iOS 10 version? Or has it been to long and you don't remember how awesomely fast 10.3.3 was on your iPhone 7? I still can't believe more people didn't notice or get bothered the change to the home button timing.

 

[smirking]

That score looks like it's in the full speed margin. The scores vary slightly each time.

I've had results that are more than slightly different. The first time I ran GeekBench 4, my iPhone 7 appeared throttled. I ran it again a few hours later and it was normal.

If you think your phone is throttled and you don't have a weak battery, try charging your phone and running it again later.
[doublepost=1514300563][/doublepost]

Unfortunately, these pictures of Geekbench results can’t be considered rock-solid proof because they can be faked by running the test in low-power mode then turning off low-power mode for the results screen.

I got pretty drastic variations just by running GeekBench 4 twice. I don't know what the deal was, but I got what appeared to be modestly throttled results one time, but it was normal a few hours later. My phone isn't showing any signs of being throttled so I can only conclude that other factors can affect GeekBench scores and the results might need to be taken with a grain of salt. We have no idea what kind of conditions people are running their tests under. If you've got tons of background tasks going, that ought to affect your score, wouldn't it?