iPad mini Battery Drainage on iPad mini (Fifth Generation, Wi-Fi+Cellular)

[Yebubbleman]

I have an iPad mini (Fifth Generation, Wi-Fi+Cellular). I love the hell out of it! But I've noticed that the battery on it drains more than any other iPad (cellular or otherwise; mini or otherwise) I've owned so far.

On standby, with no apps open, it'll drain 3-5% in a couple of hours. I had it fully charged yesterday afternoon and, without doing much of anything (save for a couple minutes of checking e-mail, a couple minutes of responding to iMessages, and a couple minutes of playing Doodle God HD [which, admittedly is an older title, but not such that it ought to drain the battery], and half a minute of logging into Hearthstone and updating the game file [no actual gameplay], it was down to 87% this afternoon.

The only thing that I can think of is that, despite being connected to Wi-Fi here, the cellular service in the house is terrible. I only have one bar of cellular. I would assume that being connected to Wi-Fi would de-prioritize the cellular modem's pursuit of a stronger connection (a phenomenon that is typically responsible for phones draining battery more quickly in areas with weaker cell signal), but maybe this isn't happening here? I don't have this problem on my iPhone XR, but that device is configured to use Wi-Fi calling (which might negate this particular issue in a way that I can't do on a cellular model iPad).

I called Apple Support mainly to have them run a battery diagnostic (as, unlike on the iPhone, battery health isn't user-visible without diagnostics). They said the battery was still rated at 100% charge capacity.

Any ideas as to what I may be experiencing here?

 

[AutomaticApple]

I have an iPad mini (Fifth Generation, Wi-Fi+Cellular). I love the hell out of it! But I've noticed that the battery on it drains more than any other iPad (cellular or otherwise; mini or otherwise) I've owned so far.

On standby, with no apps open, it'll drain 3-5% in a couple of hours. I had it fully charged yesterday afternoon and, without doing much of anything (save for a couple minutes of checking e-mail, a couple minutes of responding to iMessages, and a couple minutes of playing Doodle God HD [which, admittedly is an older title, but not such that it ought to drain the battery], and half a minute of logging into Hearthstone and updating the game file [no actual gameplay], it was down to 87% this afternoon.

The only thing that I can think of is that, despite being connected to Wi-Fi here, the cellular service in the house is terrible. I only have one bar of cellular. I would assume that being connected to Wi-Fi would de-prioritize the cellular modem's pursuit of a stronger connection (a phenomenon that is typically responsible for phones draining battery more quickly in areas with weaker cell signal), but maybe this isn't happening here? I don't have this problem on my iPhone XR, but that device is configured to use Wi-Fi calling (which might negate this particular issue in a way that I can't do on a cellular model iPad).

I called Apple Support mainly to have them run a battery diagnostic (as, unlike on the iPhone, battery health isn't user-visible without diagnostics). They said the battery was still rated at 100% charge capacity.

Any ideas as to what I may be experiencing here?

Is background refresh on or off?

 

[Yebubbleman]

Is background refresh on or off?

Unsure. Whatever the default option is. I haven't changed that. What I am going to do is test drainage with cellular turned off and see if my poor reception has anything to do with it.

 

[Gandek]

Try it with full on airplane mode at night

 

[Yebubbleman]

Is background refresh on or off?

Just checked. It's on. Again, I didn't change this. But even with apps closed, is your hypothesis here that the number of apps that I have installed and active on this contributing to battery drainage?

 

[Yebubbleman]

Try it with full on airplane mode at night

Solid idea. I'm going to try with cellular off at first and see what difference that makes. Then Airplane mode is next.

 

[tops2]

For what its worth, I have a mini 4 and a 2018 11" Pro. Especially after iOS 12 or 13, the battery always seems to drain much faster on the mini 4, especially when actively using it. If I use it more heavily, I need to charge it everyday. I used to be able to go a few days before needing to charge it. Probably combination of aging battery and all the new things they add to iOS..

Based on the faster battery drain of mine compared to what you described you did, sounds like the drain is reasonable in my opinion.

 

[Yebubbleman]

Is background refresh on or off?

Try it with full on airplane mode at night

Turned off Cellular sometime yesterday evening, and late morning/early afternoon today it was still at 100%. So, battery drain was normal (or at least akin to what it is on my Wi-Fi only model fourth generation iPad Air). So, my theory on cellular must be somewhat spot on. The previous cellular iPad I had was a 5th Generation model. I always connected that one to the charger at night before going to bed, so I don't have good info to compare this current experience to. Still though, I wonder if this degree of battery drain while connected to a Wi-Fi network AND a weak cellular connection is normal behavior. It seems like it ought to not be given that it's not like this cellular model mini needs to send texts or make phone calls. I guess it technically does receive its own SMS messages from Verizon, but I wouldn't think that would make a big difference in terms of it constantly trying to find better cell signal (especially when Wi-Fi should make that moot). Is there a cellular model iPad equivalent setting of "Wi-Fi Calling" that I can turn on? My guess is that'd remedy this.

 

[Yebubbleman]

Turned off Cellular sometime yesterday evening, and late morning/early afternoon today it was still at 100%. So, battery drain was normal (or at least akin to what it is on my Wi-Fi only model fourth generation iPad Air). So, my theory on cellular must be somewhat spot on. The previous cellular iPad I had was a 5th Generation model. I always connected that one to the charger at night before going to bed, so I don't have good info to compare this current experience to. Still though, I wonder if this degree of battery drain while connected to a Wi-Fi network AND a weak cellular connection is normal behavior. It seems like it ought to not be given that it's not like this cellular model mini needs to send texts or make phone calls. I guess it technically does receive its own SMS messages from Verizon, but I wouldn't think that would make a big difference in terms of it constantly trying to find better cell signal (especially when Wi-Fi should make that moot). Is there a cellular model iPad equivalent setting of "Wi-Fi Calling" that I can turn on? My guess is that'd remedy this.

Here's something even stranger, that probably correlates to this:

I have an iPhone 7 Plus that I bought new in box from Swappa. It came with a Verizon SIM card installed. iOS activated fine, seeing this SIM card, however there is no data plan. It still shows me the Verizon bars, despite not having active cell service.

This thing is basically an iPod touch.

I assumed that it would have stellar battery life given that it's not on a cell plan. But, in actuality, its battery life is abysmal, despite still being at 100% battery health. It probably has a worse battery life than the iPhone 7 Plus that served as my former actual phone (not the same iPhone 7 Plus as the one I've been talking about so far), which started to have the "Service Battery soon" warning under the battery health. I chalked this up to iOS 14 REALLY not being optimized for long battery life on the 7 Plus. But I'm now thinking that, despite not being on an active plan, this non-activated iPhone 7 Plus is ALSO trying to find stronger cell service despite not having an active cell plan and having sufficient internet connectivity via Wi-Fi. I can't turn on Wi-Fi Calling because there is no active cell plan and on my mini 5, that option doesn't exist because it's an iPad. I don't have battery drain issues whatsoever on my iPhone XR, presumably because it's my current activated phone and Wi-Fi calling is enabled (and presumably that's why the 7 Plus that served as my XR's predecessor had a better battery life while having a battery in worse health - because it also had Wi-Fi calling enabled). In fact, my XR gets 3-4 days of battery life.

Perhaps the moral of the story is don't live somewhere with poor cellular reception while having cellular on something that has a SIM card but can't support Wi-Fi calling or else you'll see tremendous battery drain.