I have found my battery drain issue

[RevToTheRedline]

After days of being pissed off with iOS 5 threatening myself to go back to iOS 4.. I think I have figured it out.. I started off with a standard upgrade to iOS 5, playing around with the new features, seeing my battery meter tick off 1% a minute but standby still good, 8+ hours per percent.. I started turning off features like recommended, reducing notifications, tuning off location services completely, turning off Ping. All that jazz.

Still getting under 5 hours of battery at 1%.. I tried 2 full cycles of 0-100% charge to see if the "calibration" trick would work, still no.. Until to my realization when I took it off the charge at 6pm last night, used it achieving 6 to nearly 7 minutes per percent on wifi... I'm at 5+ hours at 50% and 16 hours standby.. This morning a buddy woke up and started iMessenging me, all of a sudden BOOM 1-2 minutes per percent again... I've come to realize that since I installed iOS 5 that's one of the most used features for me until the gap last night/this morning up until now... It seems that iMessage is destroying my battery and maybe yours too.

-App stores, browsing, email, twitter, taking pictures, on wifi = average 5.63 minutes per percent of usage

-JUST iMessage, on wifi = average of 2 minutes per percent of usage.

 

[zzup]

1 or 2 percent pr minute is alot..

It accually sounds too good to be true.. But well, i have no problems

 

[RevToTheRedline]

1 or 2 percent pr minute is alot..

It accually sounds too good to be true.. But well, i have no problems

*1-2 minutes per percent, but yeah.

If i was getting 30 seconds per percent, I'd be reactivating my Droid X, cause it got better than that.

 

[gloss]

Hm. No battery issues with iMessage here. :/

 

[Thetonyk123]

If you still don't like your battery restore as new. Should help

 

[echo2011]

I fixed my battery issues with a restore after upgrading to iOS 5, choosing set phone up as new instead of from a backup, then added my apps back manually, and then synced my contacts with my gmail account. I am now back with excellent battery life.

 

[CBR900RR]

I fixed my battery issues with a restore after upgrading to iOS 5, choosing set phone up as new instead of from a backup, then added my apps back manually, and then synced my contacts with my gmail account. I am now back with excellent battery life.

Same experience here, never restore from back up and I never have battery problem

 

[treyjustice]

my battery life has been stellar so far on ios 5 with iphone 4... first i thought it was getting worse but I easily get 15ish hours and still have 30% left when i go to bed

 

[7timethecrystal]

It wasn't iMessage on my older 4S that I got replaced by Apple. It was some background task in iOS 5 that continuously chewed even when the phone was in standby or faulty hardware surrounding either the WiFi radio or 3G. After two full restores, deleting all e-mail accounts and internet apps, it still lost 6-7%/hr on standby. And it said the phone was in continuous use.

The new 4S I got works like a dream.

 

[advan031]

No issues with battery usage with iMessage here. Make sure your phone is not backing up to the iCloud when you're connected to Wifi or syncing wireless to iTunes. I turned both features off.

 

[some-dude]

I haven't really noticed any changes to battery consumption with iOS 5. Not saying it doesn't happen... just hasn't happened to me.

 

[diamond.g]

After days of being pissed off with iOS 5 threatening myself to go back to iOS 4.. I think I have figured it out.. I started off with a standard upgrade to iOS 5, playing around with the new features, seeing my battery meter tick off 1% a minute but standby still good, 8+ hours per percent.. I started turning off features like recommended, reducing notifications, tuning off location services completely, turning off Ping. All that jazz.

Still getting under 5 hours of battery at 1%.. I tried 2 full cycles of 0-100% charge to see if the "calibration" trick would work, still no.. Until to my realization when I took it off the charge at 6pm last night, used it achieving 6 to nearly 7 minutes per percent on wifi... I'm at 5+ hours at 50% and 16 hours standby.. This morning a buddy woke up and started iMessenging me, all of a sudden BOOM 1-2 minutes per percent again... I've come to realize that since I installed iOS 5 that's one of the most used features for me until the gap last night/this morning up until now... It seems that iMessage is destroying my battery and maybe yours too.

-App stores, browsing, email, twitter, taking pictures, on wifi = average 5.63 minutes per percent of usage

-JUST iMessage, on wifi = average of 2 minutes per percent of usage.

Just a note, according to Anandtech iMessage prefers the 3G connection for messages that do not include attachments.

 

[codelode84]

My battery wasn't the hottest but it has adjusted in use and now I am getting a whole day of use out of it easy. I went to bed with 40% left and I used the phone a ton. Happy with it.

 

[iPagan]

Restore as New??

To those who suggest Restore as New:

How many apps do you have??

I have over 100 apps. Can you imagine the nightmare of downloading them one by one manually!? And you have to organize them into folders to boot!!!!

That'd take me TWO days!

I have found turning off iMessage helps.

I have also turned off Push notifications for my emails.

And turning off 3G, Data, WiFi, before turning on Airplane Mode when not in use helps as well.

 

[ericrwalker]

Sounds like the perfect chance to go through and NOT sync the apps you don't use.

Set it up and do it as you to bed, that's how I normally do it.

To those who suggest Restore as New:

How many apps do you have??

I have over 100 apps. Can you imagine the nightmare of downloading them one by one manually!? And you have to organize them into folders to boot!!!!

That'd take me TWO days!

I have found turning off iMessage helps.

I have also turned off Push notifications for my emails.

And turning off 3G, Data, WiFi, before turning on Airplane Mode when not in use helps as well.

 

[jkozlow3]

To those who suggest Restore as New:

How many apps do you have??

I have over 100 apps. Can you imagine the nightmare of downloading them one by one manually!? And you have to organize them into folders to boot!!!!

That'd take me TWO days!

Huh? You don't have your apps in iTunes on your computer? I setup my phone as a new phone every time an iOS update is released and it takes 10 minutes for all of my apps to transfer over USB when I sync them again. Probably takes another 5 minutes to put them into folders. Not a big deal.

 

[bsbuggs]

I started out today (800) this morning with my wifes iphone 4 (running ios 4.1 and jailbroken) and my iphone 4s both at 100% aand have been using them simultaneously through the day so far im at 72% and her is at 85...so there defiantly seems to be a difference...i have not used the maps ot siri today at all...
I have cycled battery on the 4s as well.

 

[lnferno]

I don't think that there's going to be a "silver bullet" resolution for everyone. It seems that there are different things affecting the battery life. I've seen a lot of different resolutions (including my own) and a lot of them differ. I haven't seen a commonality between any of these issues, so it's hard to say what the culprit is. I use the heck out of iMessage and that hasn't affected by battery life at all. WiFi Sync is what killed my battery life. Ever since I turned that off, it fixed my issue. In my case, I found that my phone didn't necessarily need to be plugged in for it to be polling with iTunes. You can still manually sync wirelessly even if your iPhone is not plugged in with power. Just by having that constant polling connection between my iPhone and iTunes absolutely killed my batter life. After turning that option off and resetting my network settings, it's been back to normal. But again, my main point is that I'm not suggesting that "my fix" is going to solve everyone's problem. For the OP, I'm glad he found his resolution to his problem. It seems like there should be a sticky with a collection of fixes so the affected users can go through the process of elimination to see what fix may possibly work.

 

[rdp5008]

My phone battery drains in under 2 hours....even if the damn thing is just sitting on my desk not being used at all! Way to go Apple!

 

[Outrigger]

I have found turning off iMessage helps.

I have also turned off Push notifications for my emails.

And turning off 3G, Data, WiFi, before turning on Airplane Mode when not in use helps as well.

At this rate, what are you using your phone for? Might as well as going back to a flip phone if you're turning everything off just to conserve battery.

Some people complain about the iphone still using single core, well not its dual core, the battery is gonna take a hit. There are others complaining about the lack of LTE, well guess what, if the 4S had LTE then you have more people complain about the crappy battery life.

Point is, the battery tech is not catching up with what companies are packing into phones. I rather drive a four banger than a 600HP car but can only go for 10 miles til needing refuel.

 

[iPagan]

?... Probably takes another 5 minutes to put them into folders. Not a big deal.

You must be one superman, bud!

It took me about one hour last night to organize my 100 plus apps into folders. Somehow, Infinidock messed up my folders.

Now, on a related note, how do you exactly transfer apps from iTunes in your computer to your phone/iPad, when you choose Restore as New?

Never done this before. Have always restored from a backup.

 

[xraydoc]

Everything on - iMessage, push email (three exchange accounts), notifications, location services, wifi, bluetooth, Siri, iCloud, Ping... you name it, it's on. Brightness at about 70% with auto adjust on.

Signal strength is presently 5 bars of Verizon 3G.

My battery life on my 4S has been just as good as on my 4 with iOS 4.x.

Currently: Standby = 8hrs, 45min; Usage = 1hr, 12min; Charge left = 83%

 

[HazyCloud]

You must be one superman, bud!

It took me about one hour last night to organize my 100 plus apps into folders. Somehow, Infinidock messed up my folders.

Now, on a related note, how do you exactly transfer apps from iTunes in your computer to your phone/iPad, when you choose Restore as New?

Never done this before. Have always restored from a backup.

You can add them from the 'Applications' tab in iTunes.

 

[MooneyFlyer]

It doesn't actually take too long to add them back. I take caps of each screen so I can remember how they are organized on the phone before I restore. I have a total of about 300 apps in my library and I probably used 50-60 of them or so. Anytime I restore as new I use it as an opportunity to purge apps I don't use often.

Plus, now you can download previously purchased apps really easily so you don't have to have everything with you.

(And I've done it 3 times in the last week with this battery issue!) If it doesn't get better I'm heading to Apple.

 

[tivoboy]

I'm sorry

My phone battery drains in under 2 hours....even if the damn thing is just sitting on my desk not being used at all! Way to go Apple!

I'm sorry this is happening, but at the same time I simply cannot believe it.