iOS 16 Battery Drain Thread

[decypher44]

This is ridiculous. It’s been how long since 16? My phone still gets hot af, and the battery drains a lot faster than before 16. Just got this pop up. And I’m not even doing anything!

Btw - it’s hot where I am, but me and my phone have been in an air conditioned office all day.

 

[uncming]

On 16.1 b3 on a 13PM, still not good but have noticed that it’ll hang around 100 for a good bit then quickly drops from there. Also my health dropped from 100 to 99 after the update, could just be coincidence but I can’t help but wonder whether the algorithm changed or the significant battery drain and increased charge cycle contributed…

 

[max2]

I notice when my cellular signal is 1 bar I get less battery life on my iPhone 14 Pro Max.

 

[JulianL]

I noticed battery drain with iOS 16.0.2 on my 14 Pro Max as well. But I noticed that there is *something* starting/triggering it.

I can be fine for 1-2 days and get no battery drain, same screen on time like on my 13 Pro Max. Then, something happens, and from that moment on, it drains about 30% faster. And it will keep doing that, for days. Until I reboot the iPhone. Then it will be fine again for 1-2 days.

So far I wasn't able to identify what triggers it. And no, it's not any individual apps doing that, as in the battery statistics I see literally no activity at all that looks suspicious.

I do have a weather lock screen widget, so maybe it is a bug related to that which only shows up sometimes (and then gets stuck until I reboot). Let's see what iOS 16.1 brings.

Ah. You seem to be seeing exactly the same behaviour as me on the same phone model. After my post a few posts up about how much battery I lost overnight my phone continued to drain battery faster than usual through the day just as you describe.

I also have a couple of the weather widgets on my lock screen and I’m also wondering if that is the problem. I think I’ll remove them for now and see what that does. I suppose I should probably do a reset too based on your experience.

By reset do you mean long-hold on the power button to get the power-off slider to do a power off and then power it on again or is there some deeper reset (short of re-initialising the phone) that I don’t know about?

 

[ManuCH]

Ah. You seem to be seeing exactly the same behaviour as me on the same phone model. After my post a few posts up about how much battery I lost overnight my phone continued to drain battery faster than usual through the day just as you describe.

I also have a couple of the weather widgets on my lock screen and I’m also wondering if that is the problem. I think I’ll remove them for now and see what that does. I suppose I should probably do a reset too based on your experience.

By reset do you mean long-hold on the power button to get the power-off slider to do a power off and then power it on again or is there some deeper reset (short of re-initialising the phone) that I don’t know about?

Let us know if removing the weather widgets helps.

And by reset I just mean the regular power-off slider. Some people swear by the "hard reset" (volume up - volume down - power until the apple appears), but that made no difference in my case.

 

[anshuvorty]

Let us know if removing the weather widgets helps.

And by reset I just mean the regular power-off slider. Some people swear by the "hard reset" (volume up - volume down - power until the apple appears), but that made no difference in my case.

I have done a battery life test by removing the weather widget. Here are my results (yours may be different).

The parameters:

• AOD is on
• Weather widgets on the lockscreen are removed (to see if battery life is higher or not)

Here is the data:

max capacity (%)	total elapsed time (hours)
100	0
90	2
86	3.23
84	3.93
66	8.98
40	12.2
30	14.33
~ total battery life	21.16 hrs

Here is the line graph generated from the data above:

View attachment 2083501


Here is the battery health graph from iOS:

View attachment 2083500


Here are the overall facts from my own testing:

• AOD on + weather widgets on lockscreen
  
  • battery life: 14 - 16 hours
• AOD off
  
  • battery life: 20-23 hours
• AOD on + no weather widgets on lockscreen
  • battery life: 22 hours

In my own testing, it seems that on the iPhone 14 Pro, you get the best battery life if you take the following actions:

• turn AOD off OR
• turn AOD on but remove weather widgets on the lockscreen

 

[GrandeLatte]

To me removing weather widgets doesn't help because I never had them to begin with.

 

[pw5a29]

I have done a battery life test by removing the weather widget. Here are my results (yours may be different).

The parameters:

• AOD is on
• Weather widgets on the lockscreen are removed (to see if battery life is higher or not)

Here is the data:

max capacity (%)	total elapsed time (hours)
100	0
90	2
86	3.23
84	3.93
66	8.98
40	12.2
30	14.33
~ total battery life	21.16 hrs

Here is the line graph generated from the data above:

View attachment 2083501


Here is the battery health graph from iOS:

View attachment 2083500


Here are the overall facts from my own testing:

• AOD on + weather widgets on lockscreen
  
  • battery life: 14 - 16 hours
• AOD off
  
  • battery life: 20-23 hours
• AOD on + no weather widgets on lockscreen
  • battery life: 22 hours

In my own testing, it seems that on the iPhone 14 Pro, you get the best battery life if you take the following actions:

• turn AOD off OR
• turn AOD on but remove weather widgets on the lockscreen

AOD off

• battery life: 20-23 hours

For AOD off here, do you still have the weather widgets on the lockscreen?

 

[JulianL]

Let us know if removing the weather widgets helps.

And by reset I just mean the regular power-off slider. Some people swear by the "hard reset" (volume up - volume down - power until the apple appears), but that made no difference in my case.

Thanks. That's what I thought (and usually do myself) re a reset.

On the weather widgets, too early to tell yet but when I took my phone off the charger just now both of the weather widgets I had on the lock screen, the rain and the wind ones, were locked up as in displaying dashes instead of numbers for percentage chance of rain and wind speed/direction. I've deleted the weather widgets (replaced them with the calendar widget for now) and done a power off/on reset. I'll see how that goes and report back.

It's possible it's a general problem with lock screen widgets which given that it's a new feature in iOS 16 wouldn't be a total surprise, new features often have issues to work out on the first release. If I still have problems I think my next step will be to delete all lock screen widgets. Weather does seem slightly different to the other two I have though (activity rings and battery). Weather has to go out to the network to get up to date data so if they got in a funny state of constantly trying (and failing) to refresh that could be almost as hard on the network as streaming something whereas activity rings doesn't need anything more than the health data already on the phone. Battery might be a bit more refresh-hungry for me because I have an Apple Watch so I suppose it needs to contact the watch over Bluetooth every now and then but that's going to be lower power than getting weather info over WiFi or mobile data and maybe less prone to failure. And hopefully calendar leaves the updating to the calendar app so the lock screen widget just does a local data access on the phone to get its content from the calendar app & doesn't trigger any extra network traffic.

I do hope it is something that is fairly easy to identify, hence for Apple to fix. I bought my 14 Pro Max to get pretty much the best battery life in the industry not to find it unable to make it to the end of the day starting from a charge level that with my 13 Pro Max would have got me through another 2 whole full days with about 15% charge still left at the end of the second day.

 

[Hicksmat1976]

This is ridiculous. It’s been how long since 16? My phone still gets hot af, and the battery drains a lot faster than before 16. Just got this pop up. And I’m not even doing anything!

Btw - it’s hot where I am, but me and my phone have been in an air conditioned office all day.

View attachment 2083213

I did say elsewhere on here this is a bug I think. People are correct that this is a good feature to stop the phone overheating and protect the long term battery health, but no one seems to be thinking about why this message is coming up, particularly when not doing intensive tasks. Could point to a hardware issue, not necessarily battery, which is contributing to making the phone temp hot. I went into the Apple store to discuss this, they didnt see this message before and are going to research it. my phone passed all App Store tests, but they did say it could be the logic board.

 

[Ewan Hoozarmy]

I've been suffering the same battery issues and nothing has worked so far on my iPhone 14 Pro.

So earlier today I used my Mac to Option > Check for Update and installed the IOS 6.0.2 IPSW again. This finally seems to have done the trick, my battery graph is now looking normal...

Worth a try for anyone else suffering. I won't be doing OTA updates from now on.

 

[kofman13]

iPhone 13 pro here, i literally have to charge twice as often with the same usage now in iOS 16. This is really bad. i always dismissed the conspiracy that they nerf battery life to make you get the new iPhone, saying that the new features added just drain battery life a little. But this is ridiculous. my battery life is literally twice as bad. I wish i could downgrade to iOS 15

 

[kofman13]

Someone with iOS16 on iPhone 13 mini?
I was on 16 for a day, but found the battery worse than 15.6.1. Did DFU restore and found immediate improvement.
Anyone with 13 mini?

What’s the difference between DFU restore and regular factory reset from settings? i think its the same thing?

 

[bmac4]

This has been the worst update I have seen from Apple for battery life. Never before have I had a brand new iPhone and the battery life isn’t amazing. I don’t understand why Apple can’t figure it out. I know the AOD will drain the battery some, but that’s not the issue here. I’ve been running the beta on my iPhone 13 PM since beta 2, and it hasn’t been good almost the whole time. I think of the updates was ok, but nothing like iOS 15. At this point are we just going to have to assume Apple isn’t gonna figure out battery life, and we are stuck with y battery life for the remainder of iOS 16?

Oh and add that I have a brand new iPhone 14 PM, so old battery isn’t an issue here.

 

[FeliApple]

This has been the worst update I have seen from Apple for battery life. Never before have I had a brand new iPhone and the battery life isn’t amazing. I don’t understand why Apple can’t figure it out. I know the AOD will drain the battery some, but that’s not the issue here. I’ve been running the beta on my iPhone 13 PM since beta 2, and it hasn’t been good almost the whole time. I think of the updates was ok, but nothing like iOS 15. At this point are we just going to have to assume Apple isn’t gonna figure out battery life, and we are stuck with y battery life for the remainder of iOS 16?

Oh and add that I have a brand new iPhone 14 PM, so old battery isn’t an issue here.

I agree. I don’t have a new iPhone (I use an iPhone Xʀ on iOS 12), but this is the first time ever that I’ve seen more reports of very poor battery life than reports of good - or expected - battery life on a new iPhone running the original version of iOS.

Yes, there were mediocre results, they always have been there. Bugs, usage too heavy for the device’s battery life, which meant, henceforth, that people expected too much, background processes stuck, and the inevitable reports of extreme standby drain that followed. Yes, all that has always been present. Now though? It’s the majority. The vast majority of screenshots shared here do not surpass 8 hours of 80% Wi-Fi/20% mobile data web browsing. Unless every setting is on and brightness is always at 3000%, that’s way too low.

I recall that with light to moderate usage, the iPhone 6s would get 7-8 hours of use for the vast majority of people here. I also recall that very few people said it was horrible, barely scraping 3-4. Throughout several tens of pages of results, I saw maybe 5 or 6. Here, we have exactly the opposite ratio. With Safari being the main app, I’d expect at least 11-12 hours of moderate use. I‘m getting that with a camera-centric usage on my Xʀ (on iOS 12), and the 14 Pro Max should be way better.

I’m surprised, and I’d love to give it a shot myself.

 

[kofman13]

Following question for you guys.
1. Do you get better performance and battery life if you update from iOS 15 >16 and then do a restore? That’s what i did every year. This time time i just updated and continued using. Maybe thats why battery life is worse?
2. Is there a way to downgrade 13pro to iOS 15?

 

[sorgo †]

This has been the worst update I have seen from Apple for battery life. Never before have I had a brand new iPhone and the battery life isn’t amazing. I don’t understand why Apple can’t figure it out. I know the AOD will drain the battery some, but that’s not the issue here. I’ve been running the beta on my iPhone 13 PM since beta 2, and it hasn’t been good almost the whole time. I think of the updates was ok, but nothing like iOS 15. At this point are we just going to have to assume Apple isn’t gonna figure out battery life, and we are stuck with y battery life for the remainder of iOS 16?

Oh and add that I have a brand new iPhone 14 PM, so old battery isn’t an issue here.

Have you tried the 16.1 beta lately? I find the latest one to be far better as far as battery drain goes. And I’m not the only one—you can check the beta thread to see more testimonials.

 

[bmac4]

I agree. I don’t have a new iPhone (I use an iPhone Xʀ on iOS 12), but this is the first time ever that I’ve seen more reports of very poor battery life than reports of good - or expected - battery life on a new iPhone running the original version of iOS.

Yes, there were mediocre results, they always have been there. Bugs, usage too heavy for the device’s battery life, which meant, henceforth, that people expected too much, background processes stuck, and the inevitable reports of extreme standby drain that followed. Yes, all that has always been present. Now though? It’s the majority. The vast majority of screenshots shared here do not surpass 8 hours of 80% Wi-Fi/20% mobile data web browsing. Unless every setting is on and brightness is always at 3000%, that’s way too low.

I recall that with light to moderate usage, the iPhone 6s would get 7-8 hours of use for the vast majority of people here. I also recall that very few people said it was horrible, barely scraping 3-4. Throughout several tens of pages of results, I saw maybe 5 or 6. Here, we have exactly the opposite ratio. With Safari being the main app, I’d expect at least 11-12 hours of moderate use. I‘m getting that with a camera-centric usage on my Xʀ (on iOS 12), and the 14 Pro Max should be way better.

I’m surprised, and I’d love to give it a shot myself.

Right I expect bugs. That’s always part of this process, but battery life is usually figured out by now. I don’t understand. It seems like bugs have gotten worse, and many haven’t been fixed from iOS 13. The battery one though is mind blogging.

I remember last year the big thing was battery life and Apple was presenting it at the keynote like it was a feature. Now with a new phone, it’s worse than it was last year when the 13s were released. How do we take a step back?

 

[bmac4]

Have you tried the 16.1 beta lately? I find the latest one to be far better as far as battery drain goes. And I’m not the only one—you can check the beta thread to see more testimonials.

I am on 16.1 beta 3 now. It’s better but it’s not what the 13 PM was with iOS 15. It’s for sure better, but I would expect equal for a brand new phone.

 

[FeliApple]

Right I expect bugs. That’s always part of this process, but battery life is usually figured out by now. I don’t understand. It seems like bugs have gotten worse, and many haven’t been fixed from iOS 13. The battery one though is mind blogging.

I remember last year the big thing was battery life and Apple was presenting it at the keynote like it was a feature. Now with a new phone, it’s worse than it was last year when the 13s were released. How do we take a step back?

Yeah, Apple has been touting battery life since the Xʀ - rightly so, it’s been very good - but this iteration is, like you said, mind-boggling. Hopefully it resolves at some point before iOS 17. Also like you said, it’s the first time ever really that it has taken a step back (and what a step back, it is quite poor). Really puzzling.

 

[JDJones92]

My battery stats have tanked since I got this phone, ios16 is doing a number on me. The first image from Feb 22, second from today and it's an iPhone 13 mini, battery health at 97% now (It was 100%, 16 took it to 99%, 16.1 then 98% for a few days and now 97%)

 

[sorgo †]

I am on 16.1 beta 3 now. It’s better but it’s not what the 13 PM was with iOS 15. It’s for sure better, but I would expect equal for a brand new phone.

Well, I’m glad you’re at least getting the best iOS 16 experience. Here’s to hoping things continue smoothing out as we approach 16.1 public.

 

[bmac4]

Yeah, Apple has been touting battery life since the Xʀ - rightly so, it’s been very good - but this iteration is, like you said, mind-boggling. Hopefully it resolves at some point before iOS 17. Also like you said, it’s the first time ever really that it has taken a step back (and what a step back, it is quite poor). Really puzzling.

I expected the betas to be bad on battery, but I didn’t think it would role like this. I thought they would have it figured out.

 

[bmac4]

Well, I’m glad you’re at least getting the best iOS 16 experience. Here’s to hoping things continue smoothing out as we approach 16.1 public.

I sure hope so. I think I am on track to about 20 hours before zero right now, but I am not heavily using my phone, so if I did, I think it would be closer to 16 or 17 hours. That’s not great to me. I could go to bed with 40 or 50% left a lot on iOS 15. Here’s to hoping full release iOS 16.1 is much better.

 

[Lexio]

So in my case (iPhone 14PM) the battery problem is caused by CarPlay and the Apple Maps I use with it. About 25% of the battery usage is because of Apple Maps. So for now I have to stop using CarPlay when I want to come with the phone through one full day.