iPad Pro iPad Pro 2018 battery repair?

[chfilm]

Hey guys,

I’m sitting here with my trusty 2018 ipp which is still perfectly capable of doing everything I need it for.. yet the desire for oled is strong because I sometimes need to check color grades on it..and the battery on this device has been subpar for so long that it’s not like I expec from an iPad anymore. Especially in standby it just drains like crazy to the point where it’s often just empty when I pick it up to use it. Also my device suffers from a yellow tint on the right edge of the screen for quite some time now.

i wasn’t aware until recently that you can have apple repair it for 150 bucks... has anybody done that? since there’s no way to look at battery health, I wonder how much it would help, especially with the standby issue. I was for a long time convinced that its some sort of software issue, but now I feel it also emptying faster than it used to during normal usage.

it sucks that the new iPad cant so a single thing other than potentially the video reviewing in my case better than this 6 year old device, yet I still want it but can’t justify spending 2k on it right now..

 

[okkibs]

Plug it in to a Mac and open the app coconut battery, you can find it here, and it might be in the app store: https://coconut-flavour.com/coconutbattery/

It will tell you the battery health. It should show at least as 79%, then you can attempt to get the entire iPad replaced with a battery service. Apple might use a slightly different value that might be higher, but it might be the same. But it's worth trying if it shows at least 79%. If it shows something higher then Apple will see a higher value as well and won't replace the iPad if it's above 80%.

You would get the yellow tint removed with the replacement iPad unless Apple flags that as a defect and refuses to replace the iPad. In that case you couldn't get a new battery anyways.

Standby drain is an issue with all current iPads. My M4 drains a couple percent every night just like my M1 does. After about 2 weeks in standby it will run out. This is normal and not an issue, unfortunately that is how long you can expect standby to work.

I would replace the entire iPad with a new model and sell the old iPad. 6 years is not a bad run and a new one would see significant improvents, as you said the OLED display is worth the upgrade as well.

Or you can see if it is available for replacement with the battery service, then you can keep it for a while as is and sell it later. You'd get back at least the money for the battery replacement. Then you don't have to spend so much money right away.

After 6 years the battery is certainly at the end of its reasonable lifespan. It won't fix standby drain issues as that happens on every iPad now and isn't really considered an issue, but it will improve battery life during use.

 

[chfilm]

Wait so I'm not sure if I follow correctly- you're saying if I go to Apple and the Battery is at 84% as it shows here, they would replace the entire ipad for 150€ and give me a new 2018 one instead of swapping the battery?
That would be great, even for ramping up the resale value - in that case I'd probably wait another year till the M4 drops in price, as I can't see any dramatic upgrades that would justify an m5 in the next two years..

regarding the standby drain, it's way worse than what you described, it drops about 10% minimum per 12 hours just by sitting there. If i go into airplane mode I might get like 2-5%.

 

[NVDA]

Wait so I'm not sure if I follow correctly- you're saying if I go to Apple and the Battery is at 84% as it shows here, they would replace the entire ipad for 150€ and give me a new 2018 one instead of swapping the battery?
That would be great, even for ramping up the resale value - in that case I'd probably wait another year till the M4 drops in price, as I can't see any dramatic upgrades that would justify an m5 in the next two years..
View attachment 2397224
regarding the standby drain, it's way worse than what you described, it drops about 10% minimum per 12 hours just by sitting there. If i go into airplane mode I might get like 2-5%.

They’ll only replace if it’s under 80%. My 2018 IPP had pretty bad battery life but Apple said it was 91%, so they wouldn’t do it.

 

[okkibs]

Wait so I'm not sure if I follow correctly- you're saying if I go to Apple and the Battery is at 84% as it shows here, they would replace the entire ipad for 150€ and give me a new 2018 one instead of swapping the battery?

No, neither nor. They never swap the battery, they always give you a good-as-new unit. Problem is yours is well above 80%. Apple measures from a different reference than coconutbattery, to adjust for that you have to add 2-4%. At best your battery is at 87% and Apple requires it to be at 79% to be eligible to pay for a battery replacement which will then replace the entire iPad.

It's very typical, most iPads won't ever qualify for a battery replacement since Apple's 79% requirement is absurd. Your battery is obviously completely shot after 5+ years but it might never even show a value low enough to qualify.

Apple chose that 79%/80% value on purpose because if they admitted your battery needs replacing they'd be swapping out millions of these old iPads around the globe and wouldn't even have enough to hand out to begin with. You could bring it into Apple and demonstrate how bad the battery life is and they'd still be forced by their training to tell you that according to Apple your battery is perfectly healthy.

 

[Digitalguy]

No, neither nor. They never swap the battery, they always give you a good-as-new unit. Problem is yours is well above 80%. Apple measures from a different reference than coconutbattery, to adjust for that you have to add 2-4%. At best your battery is at 87% and Apple requires it to be at 79% to be eligible to pay for a battery replacement which will then replace the entire iPad.

It's very typical, most iPads won't ever qualify for a battery replacement since Apple's 79% requirement is absurd. Your battery is obviously completely shot after 5+ years but it might never even show a value low enough to qualify.

Apple chose that 79%/80% value on purpose because if they admitted your battery needs replacing they'd be swapping out millions of these old iPads around the globe and wouldn't even have enough to hand out to begin with. You could bring it into Apple and demonstrate how bad the battery life is and they'd still be forced by their training to tell you that according to Apple your battery is perfectly healthy.

2-4%? more like 7-10% in my experience. They swap the iPad but the old one goes into the stock for new swaps. They only need batteries, cases and screens, which they decide how many to keep as stock (they probably make an estimation based on their statistics and on the number years they allow this service (5-7 years after end of sales in the Apple store, depending on the country). In my experience their 80% threashold is less than half the original battery life, as battery life degradation is not linear.

 

[chfilm]

No, neither nor. They never swap the battery, they always give you a good-as-new unit. Problem is yours is well above 80%. Apple measures from a different reference than coconutbattery, to adjust for that you have to add 2-4%. At best your battery is at 87% and Apple requires it to be at 79% to be eligible to pay for a battery replacement which will then replace the entire iPad.

It's very typical, most iPads won't ever qualify for a battery replacement since Apple's 79% requirement is absurd. Your battery is obviously completely shot after 5+ years but it might never even show a value low enough to qualify.

Apple chose that 79%/80% value on purpose because if they admitted your battery needs replacing they'd be swapping out millions of these old iPads around the globe and wouldn't even have enough to hand out to begin with. You could bring it into Apple and demonstrate how bad the battery life is and they'd still be forced by their training to tell you that according to Apple your battery is perfectly healthy.

😿

 

[Christopher Kim]

Everything folks have said above is true unfortunately. I really wish Apple had some diagnostic (or allowed us to see their official Battery Health stats) in Settings somewhere. Having to “guess” based on what CoconutBattery says (and I agree, with iPads, I’ve found Apple’s estimate is like 7-10% higher than CoconutBattery…)

I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone with a 2018 iPP with a <80% Battery Health (via Apple’s diagnostics) and being allowed to do the $100-150 battery replacment. I have a 10.5” iPad Pro that’s 8yrs old, clearly battery health is way lower, shows 72% on CoconutBattery, but took it in to Apple a few months ago to try and get it battery replaced, and their diagnostics showed 87%! That’s a +15% difference!

On one hand, given Apple gives you a like-new / refurb device (rather than replace the battery), they don’t want ppl taking advantage of it when they don’t need it to get an essentially new device for just $150. On the other hand, their diagnostics shouldn’t be so out of wack that clearly ppl whose iPads have sub-standard battery health should be able to get it done legitimately... It’s not our fault that Apple chose to design the iPad in a way that actually replacing the battery isn’t cost effective, and they just give you a new device…

 

[chfilm]

What a strange practice really- I should be able to decide when I want the battery swapped, not Apple. I mean I don’t need a new device, just a new battery

 

[teohyc]

Wait so I'm not sure if I follow correctly- you're saying if I go to Apple and the Battery is at 84% as it shows here, they would replace the entire ipad for 150€ and give me a new 2018 one instead of swapping the battery?
That would be great, even for ramping up the resale value - in that case I'd probably wait another year till the M4 drops in price, as I can't see any dramatic upgrades that would justify an m5 in the next two years..
View attachment 2397224
regarding the standby drain, it's way worse than what you described, it drops about 10% minimum per 12 hours just by sitting there. If i go into airplane mode I might get like 2-5%.

Sounds like my old 2018 iPad Pro.

I got the battery replaced by third party repair shop for USD 90.
Battery works fine now.

 

[Christopher Kim]

What a strange practice really- I should be able to decide when I want the battery swapped, not Apple. I mean I don’t need a new device, just a new battery

Yep, it’s not our fault that Apple designed the iPad this way, where better for them to just replace it than change the battery. Whereas with the iPhone, given Apple can much more easily replace the battery (and do so for the battery replacement fee) while they will try not to do it unless Battery Health shows <80%, if you’re close to 80% and you push/are firm, I’ve seen and heard that Apple will do it without too much of a fuss…

 

[andiwm2003]

I have the same 2018 iPad pro. My battery is lasting maybe half as long but battery health is 91%. In addition I have this frequent unresponsiveness of the touchscreen. The iPad freezes for several seconds and does not respond to touching. I would not waste another 150 bucks on a battery replacement. You can get a newer used iPad air with the same or better performance of the 2018 iPad pro for 300 bucks. At that point it makes more sense to trade it in for a new iPad air or a new iPad pro. After 6 years the iPad pro is just "used up". It's a shame because most of its components could last another three years.