Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

iPad Pro Battery drains very quickly.

J

jcmendes

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 22, 2012
162
112
Portugal
I bought an iPad 11 M5 almost a week ago and I've noticed the battery drains very quickly. Just last night it dropped 11%!! This shouldn't be normal and I'm really not happy about it.

I'm thinking of returning it because I don't want to be charging it so often if I only use it for a short time.

What's going on with iOS or Apple?
I still have a Samsung Tab S10 Ultra and it only loses 2-3% overnight. I wanted to sell it, but I think I'll keep it this way.
 
iPads have always had bad standby life. When I had a M1 Pro it would drain 30% in half a day. Not kidding. I would keep the Ultra, it's a far superior device.
 
  • Wow
Reactions: jchap
It might be worth experimenting with Low Power mode.

Use Low Power Mode to save battery life on your iPhone or iPad - Apple Support

Low Power Mode reduces the amount of power that your iPhone or iPad uses when the battery gets low.
support.apple.com support.apple.com

The first goal is to find out if the unexpected drain is more likely due to software or hardware (battery or whatever).

Turn Low Power mode on when you go to bed, and record the battery loss overnight. Do this a couple nights in a row, preferably at different battery charge levels, e.g. 100%, 80%, 60%.

Record the same measurements (overnight, different charge levels) with Low Power mode turned off. Post the results of both runs.

If there's more than a few percentage points difference in the overnight change, then it's likely that some apps are running in background and consuming power. You can find which apps are using the most power using the Battery pane in Settings. You can configure background app refresh in Settings.
 
  • Like
Reactions: MacCheetah3 and BigMcGuire
Agree on checking on app usage and adjusting background app refresh settings in order to reduce background activities during standby. I also think that the more mail and cloud synching going on the more battery drain there might be. Basically anything that's pushing/pulling data in standby and keeping the device in a higher CPU usage state.
 
  • Like
Reactions: jchap
chown33 said:
It might be worth experimenting with Low Power mode.

Use Low Power Mode to save battery life on your iPhone or iPad - Apple Support

Low Power Mode reduces the amount of power that your iPhone or iPad uses when the battery gets low.
support.apple.com support.apple.com

The first goal is to find out if the unexpected drain is more likely due to software or hardware (battery or whatever).

Turn Low Power mode on when you go to bed, and record the battery loss overnight. Do this a couple nights in a row, preferably at different battery charge levels, e.g. 100%, 80%, 60%.

Record the same measurements (overnight, different charge levels) with Low Power mode turned off. Post the results of both runs.

If there's more than a few percentage points difference in the overnight change, then it's likely that some apps are running in background and consuming power. You can find which apps are using the most power using the Battery pane in Settings. You can configure background app refresh in Settings.
Click to expand...

Low Power mode hasn't helped me. The only way I could keep standby drain down was airplane mode (wifi, bluetooth, etc. all off).

The vampire users on my devices are Home, Find My and Siri and I couldn't really do anything about those. Even with Siri disabled, it was still draining battery during standby.
 
  • Wow
Reactions: jchap
DeepSix said:
iPads have always had bad standby life. When I had a M1 Pro it would drain 30% in half a day. Not kidding. I would keep the Ultra, it's a far superior device.
Click to expand...

Sorry, but this is rubbish. All of my iPads have had excellent standby life. It’s obviously user error on your end.

My M1 would only drain a couple of percent overnight, and the same for daytime standby.

Your iPad must of had a faulty battery.

As for android devices, they drain quicker in my experience.
 
  • Like
  • Love
Reactions: cflem, sparksd and _Mitchan1999
Simacca said:
Sorry, but this is rubbish. All of my iPads have had excellent standby life. It’s obviously user error on your end.
Click to expand...

Cool that the one sentence (quoted above) explains the problem.

Simacca said:
My M1 would only drain a couple of percent overnight, and the same for daytime standby.
Click to expand...

Great!

Simacca said:
Your iPad must of had a faulty battery.
Click to expand...

Wasn’t it user error (from the first sentence I quoted above)?

Simacca said:
As for android devices, they drain quicker in my experience.
Click to expand...

Also great information!
 
Well don’t feel bad I have a iPad 11 I bought back in march and my battery is already down to 98 percent and I do kill the battery when using it which I use it a lot at home doing many things I am us to it as my other iPads drained the battery down pretty fast so I am use to it
 
DCIFRTHS said:
Cool that the one sentence (quoted above) explains the problem.



Great!



Wasn’t it user error (from the first sentence I quoted above)?



Also great information!
Click to expand...

I don’t know why you tore my post apart. I wasn’t even replying to you!
Or do you have two accounts?

Either way the iPad doesn’t have a standby battery drainage problem!

Enjoy your day…
 
Last edited:
I don't have this issue with my iPad Pro M5. I do have background app refresh disabled and use it in Full Screen Apps mode. Standby battery life has been good for me when I take it off the charger and travel with it.

I have experienced overheating and battery drain while using it in Windowed Apps mode while using Slide Over for Messages.

Unfortunately, even in Full Screen Apps mode, my 11" M5 loses battery fairly quickly while using it with Safari and Messages. I feel like they need to at least introduce Adaptive Power mode, like on the iPhone.
 
Typically when an iPad(/Pro) is on its first iOS variant, for example iPad Pro M5 on iOS 26, it is likely to lose 1-3% over an 8 hour night.

On a slightly newer iOS variant, for example iPad Pro M4 is likely to typically lose 4-6% over the same 8 hour period.

The exact specifics can vary a lot based on Wifi/5G/router model and many other specifics. For me the above is usually for Wifi, if you use 4G and turn off Wifi, sometimes the drain is lower in some homes with some routers. So it all varies on a case by case basis.

11% drain over 12+ hours is on the higher end for something like iPad Pro M5 while it has 0 cycles and is still on iOS 26, but it is not something unheard of. Typically I would expect 2-5% out of the box and this figure is likely to more than double as you hit ~100-200 cycles after 6-12 months or so.
 
  • Like
Reactions: DCIFRTHS
Simacca said:
I don’t know why you tore my post apart. I wasn’t even replying to you!
Or do you have two accounts?
Click to expand...

I did not mean to offend you. I’m sorry if it came across that way. Also, I do not have two accounts.

Simacca said:
Either way the iPad doesn’t have a standby battery drainage problem!
Click to expand...

In my opinion, a post that blames the user without any evidence that the user is at fault, is a “snap judgement”. That’s not fair to the user.

If the post suggested potential solutions, instead of blaming the person asking for help, it would come across differently.

If the OP’s issue is not background tasks, then it is possible that there is a defect in hardware (battery or other faulty component(s). My first guess is that it’s background processes.

Simacca said:
Enjoy your day…
Click to expand...

You too. I am being sincere.
Hopefully we just got off on the wrong foot, and we can move forward with no hard feelings.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Simacca
DCIFRTHS said:
I did not mean to offend you. I’m sorry if it came across that way. Also, I do not have two accounts.



In my opinion, a post that blames the user without any evidence that the user is at fault, is a “snap judgement”. That’s not fair to the user.

If the post suggested potential solutions, instead of blaming the person asking for help, it would come across differently.

If the OP’s issue is not background tasks, then it is possible that there is a defect in hardware (battery or other faulty component(s). My first guess is that it’s background processes.



You too. I am being sincere.
Hopefully we just got off on the wrong foot, and we can move forward with no hard feelings.
Click to expand...

The reason for my original reply was because the users first line of his post was, ‘All iPads have a bad standby life’, like he was stating it as a fact. This is not true.

Also many of his other posts are pro Samsung. This is an iPad group, not a Samsung group.
 
  • Like
Reactions: DCIFRTHS
DeepSix said:
iPads have always had bad standby life. When I had a M1 Pro it would drain 30% in half a day. Not kidding. I would keep the Ultra, it's a far superior device.
Click to expand...
I couldn’t disagree with this more.

I can’t comment on that particular model, but I’ve owned several iPads and they typically barely lose a few percent per day on standby.

I’m a teacher, and one year I forgot to turn off a class set of iPads before leaving for the summer. They spent over 2 months unplugged and in standby and when I came back to them in the Fall most of them still had some charge left.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Wizec and Simacca
I have the 2018 11" iPad Pro. Standby drainage can be inconsistent. It can vary even between x.x.1 versions. I did all the usual debugging stuff and turning off background refresh. One constant thing that caused drain iPhone and iPad was when I played around with Home automation, but have quickly disabled that (mostly due to frustrations with home automation reliability).

I've eventually just permanently turned on low power mode (through Shortcuts) and generally the standby drain is better.
 
tops2 said:
I have the 2018 11" iPad Pro. Standby drainage can be inconsistent. It can vary even between x.x.1 versions. I did all the usual debugging stuff and turning off background refresh. One constant thing that caused drain iPhone and iPad was when I played around with Home automation, but have quickly disabled that (mostly due to frustrations with home automation reliability).

I've eventually just permanently turned on low power mode (through Shortcuts) and generally the standby drain is better.
Click to expand...
Yeah I've been doing this on my Apple Devices. Shortcuts --> Automation - turning on low power mode by the time I go to bed and then turning it off when I wake up. Does wonders for standby. That or just leave device plugged in overnight and set charge to 80% if that works.
 
Seems to be shouting match now, not sure if there is even any input needed.... but here are my few cents with suggestions for solution...
iPads standby life is excellent, when all is normal. Every one of mine (many across family and time) has excellent standby time. As noted above 1- 2% over night, if any drain is observable at all.
Therefore this indicates some kind of problem/failure. Most likely software, but hardware problem cannot be completely discarded...

The fact that switching off networking (wifi/BT) helps gives strong suggestion, that this is either related to sync of iCloud stuff or this is related to some BT device which keep waking up the iPad. These are all well documented issues with macOS for many years - and I recall here reports about this on iOS and iPadOS also. Keep in mind, that iCloud syncing (documents, photos, calendar, messages,....) cannot be disabled from background refresh, Apple relies too much on those services so you cannot disable those - at least not all.

Few suggestions (more may be suggested better by AI tools, just ask chatGPT or Gemini):
1. remove all BT devices linked to the iPad. See if that helps.
2. log out of iCloud, restart and log back in. I recall number of reports on macOS where iCloud file syncing keeps waking up the device every few minutes since there is some problem with files/database and it keeps redownloading / reuploading same file - and failing - forever. Reset on iCloud file syncing has solved the issues, I recall.
3. There were other reports that sometimes iCloud keeps just waking up the device (kind of WOL whciuh Apple supports on macOS), not sure how that has been solved and if it is even possible on iPadOS.
Now, it is much easier to look in macOS logs to figure this out. I have no idea how to look on iPadOS logs and what it takes.
If all fails, backup and reset, restore from backup. Chances are things will sort out that way.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Simacca
I was getting super annoyed with my M4 iPad Pro for draining 30% overnight. Turns out, it wasn't the iPad's fault! The new iPad OS update installed a feature with a serious GPS addiction. After I cut it off, my iPad and I are friends again, and its battery is no longer throwing a tantrum
 

Attachments

  • IMG_0083.png
    IMG_0083.png
    257.1 KB · Views: 1
  • IMG_0082.png
    IMG_0082.png
    702.6 KB · Views: 1
returnZero said:
I was getting super annoyed with my M4 iPad Pro for draining 30% overnight. Turns out, it wasn't the iPad's fault! The new iPad OS update installed a feature with a serious GPS addiction. After I cut it off, my iPad and I are friends again, and its battery is no longer throwing a tantrum
Click to expand...
Forgive my ignorance; what did you disable?
 
Wizec said:
Forgive my ignorance; what did you disable?
Click to expand...

I believe I disabled one of those location features, but I can't remember if it was 'Improve location accuracy' or 'Significant locations' I do also remember that I tinkered with location tracking service for the Apple Pencil and AirPod Pro
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back