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zach159

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 28, 2021
7
0
Hey everyone!
So i just bought an iPhone xr with 98% and 368 cycles, I found it kind of strange because apple says that "A normal battery is designed to retain up to 80% of its original capacity at 500 complete charge cycles", so normally in my case it should be below 90%.
I wanna know if it's normal or there's something wrong with my phone?
 

now i see it

macrumors G4
Jan 2, 2002
11,239
24,220
They're saying that it "should" get at least 500 cycles before hitting 80% for warranty purposes.
20% dead after only 500 cycles is accelerated wear by almost any current standard. You should get a lot better than that.
My 5 year old phone with its original battery has 1937 load cycles on it and it is still above 90% battery health.
 
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zach159

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 28, 2021
7
0
So the cycle count in not something to worry about as long as the battery health is above 80%?
 

now i see it

macrumors G4
Jan 2, 2002
11,239
24,220
Cycle count reflects how much the battery has been used. It's sort of like an odometer but by itself doesn't reveal aging.
If a battery was charged to 100% then discharged all the way to 0%, that would be one load cycle (a very hard one).
If another battery was charged to 80% and allowed to discharge to 30%, that would be 1/2 cycle. If done like that twice, it would be one load cycle (total of 100%).

While both batteries in the example could have the same number of load cycles down the line, the one that was partially charged and discharged would probably have a 4X longer lifespan than the one that was habitually fully charged & discharged.
 

kneezmo

macrumors regular
Dec 31, 2017
235
141
I purchase mi iPhone X 256GB on march 2020, and have 100% battery health after 130 cycles :D
 

reppans

macrumors 6502
Dec 2, 2006
323
190
How old is the phone? How many hours SOT can you get on a full batt? What are your charge habits? Can you post a 24hr battery graph?
 
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zach159

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 28, 2021
7
0
How old is the phone? How many hours SOT can you get on a full batt? What are your charge habits? Can you post a 24hr battery graph?
2021_08_29_14_32_IMG_0222.JPG
2021_08_29_14_32_IMG_0223.JPG

here are my battery usage graphs. i think the phone age is more than a year.
do you think about the graphs?
 

velocityg4

macrumors 604
Dec 19, 2004
7,330
4,724
Georgia
so you think that the battery shouldn't be at that percentage and it might be a scam. guys I'm so lost now.

They were making a joke. Your battery is fine. All you should be concerned about is the current capacity (health).

Cycle count isn't a meaningful metric by itself. It's only qualitative. In determining how well a battery is made. By comparing wear, to cycle count, charging habits, age and battery care. The only time to worry is if you have abnormally high wear, to cycle count. Based on your battery care habits.

You have relatively low wear compared to your cycle count. That just means you're doing something right in you charging and storage routine.
 
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Honza1

macrumors 6502a
Nov 30, 2013
940
441
US
Hey everyone!
So i just bought an iPhone xr with 98% and 368 cycles, I found it kind of strange because apple says that "A normal battery is designed to retain up to 80% of its original capacity at 500 complete charge cycles", so normally in my case it should be below 90%.
I wanna know if it's normal or there's something wrong with my phone?
There are many web sites dedicated to explaining how to use batteries of phones so they last long. Google it.
In summary:
You are lucky. Some batteries age better than others.
and
Prior owner was likely light user. Batteries age least when cycled between 40-80%, so if you charge the phone manually to ~90% and do not discharge it below ~40%, you can get many more cycles per battery life.
Case example: my iPad Air 4, I rarely leave it on charger longer than to 90%, never over night. Was at 100% few times. Not needed in my use. And it was only few times below 20% and is rarely run below 40%. I charge it when needed, once every few days. It has 74 cycles and battery is still at 102% capacity. New battery showed as 104% (it is normal that batteries start higher than 100%).
With iPad and my use this is relatively convenient charging method, with my XR this would be inconvenient. But it shows: XR is on charger each and all night and is used daily to between 40-20%. Rarely below. But it still shows only 85% capacity at 410 cycles (started at 102% when new). However, it has been at 85% from 280 cycles. Battery life is quite non linear.
 

reppans

macrumors 6502
Dec 2, 2006
323
190
View attachment 1824893 View attachment 1824894
here are my battery usage graphs. i think the phone age is more than a year.
do you think about the graphs?

OK, making a lot of assumptions, but this what I gather. Looks/sounds like you bought used and have only owned for ~week, so you don’t know how the previous owner (‘PO’) cycled the phone. 98% is very good for a year but easily attainable if PO took care of batt, ie, unplugged before 100% charge - IIRC my XR stayed @ 100% for 14-15mo. Cycling 80-20, for example, can greatly extended a Li-ion’s cycle life…. from 500 cycles to 1500 cycles per Batt Univ.

Your 24hr graph shows a lot of intermediate plug-ins, but you can sort of extrapolate the first 4hrs as ~33%/2.4hrs, or ~13%/hr, or ~8hrs SOT on a full batt. That’s about half of Apple’s 15-16hrs SOT ‘up to’ spec for internet-video on the XR, but 50% Apple spec is pretty common from what I’ve seen of most users. FWIW, Apple‘s XR spec is perfectly feasible if you optimize the apps, settings, and charging - but you pretty much need to be a batt/runtime geek for that.

Anyways… just my $0.02
 
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reppans

macrumors 6502
Dec 2, 2006
323
190
With iPad and my use this is relatively convenient charging method, with my XR this would be inconvenient. But it shows: XR is on charger each and all night and is used daily to between 40-20%. Rarely below. But it still shows only 85% capacity at 410 cycles (started at 102% when new). However, it has been at 85% from 280 cycles. Battery life is quite non linear.

What’s wearing your XR batt is plugging in overnight/charging to 100%. I have yet to see any credible evidence that running below 40% (or 20% for that matter) is harmful on daily use device (ie, not storage situations). Actually have seen data indicating that the lower the voltage the better it is for the batt. My XR has seen 10% SoC way more than 80%, and after 2yrs is 96% health and can still probably hit 15hr SOT (posted above).

If you don’t require 100% batt to make it though the day, you can fully automate a better ‘battery optimization’ with the shortcut app and a smart plug.

Just my $0.02
 

zach159

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 28, 2021
7
0
OK, making a lot of assumptions, but this what I gather. Looks/sounds like you bought used and have only owned for ~week, so you don’t know how the previous owner (‘PO’) cycled the phone. 98% is very good for a year but easily attainable if PO took care of batt, ie, unplugged before 100% charge - IIRC my XR stayed @ 100% for 14-15mo. Cycling 80-20, for example, can greatly extended a Li-ion’s cycle life…. from 500 cycles to 1500 cycles per Batt Univ.

Your 24hr graph shows a lot of intermediate plug-ins, but you can sort of extrapolate the first 4hrs as ~33%/2.4hrs, or ~13%/hr, or ~8hrs SOT on a full batt. That’s about half of Apple’s 15-16hrs SOT ‘up to’ spec for internet-video on the XR, but 50% Apple spec is pretty common from what I’ve seen of most users. FWIW, Apple‘s XR spec is perfectly feasible if you optimize the apps, settings, and charging - but you pretty much need to be a batt/runtime geek for that.

Anyways… just my $0.02
Okey, also i just wanna know why i get 5~6 hrs SOT on ~70% i found it very low for a 98% battery health, why it can't it hit the 14 or 15hrs SOT on a 100%.
 

reppans

macrumors 6502
Dec 2, 2006
323
190
Okey, also i just wanna know why i get 5~6 hrs SOT on ~70% i found it very low for a 98% battery health, why it can't it hit the 14 or 15hrs SOT on a 100%.

That’s a deep rabbit hole, and everyone’s priorities are different. Apple’s default settings tend to be set-up more for ‘features’ than ‘runtime’ - if you want to shift that default priority, then you need go through all the settings and turn-off the ‘features’ you don’t use, or don’t care about, and that includes turning-off antennas (cellular, blue-tooth, wifi, gps) when you are not using them. Every feature has a cost/benefit - you have to decide what’s worth it to you.

Just a few settings off the top of my head: use fetch email; turn off background refresh (and/or force close apps); use low screen brightness; manually adjust brightness (turns off light sensor?); minimize haptic feedback; turn-off cellular and use wifi-calling while at home; turn-off constant microphone monitoring ‘hey Siri’; turn-off constant accelerometer use (fitness app step counter, lift-to-wake); use 2.4g wifi; etc, etc. Surfing on wifi uses less batt than surfing on cellular. Reading/writing text uses less batt than gaming, video streaming, or surfing photos/images, etc. etc.

Then there’re the apps, I’m primarily a text surfer (mostly wifi - this is also my ‘home computer’) of enthusiast forums - Apollo (for Reddit) is my most efficient app <5%/hr; Tapatalk for other enthusiast forums (like this one) is next most efficient. Then Apples Safari/News apps are in the 8%/hr range. From the 24hr/10d battery graphs, if you toggle the apps between %-battery <> hours-usage, you can get an excellent feel for the relative efficiency between your top apps. Also, if you know your average runtime and relative app efficiency, then it’s easy to spot excessive batt drain from rogue apps and/or stuck processing loops. I had a few from the the official Reddit app.

Hope that helps.
 
Last edited:

Honza1

macrumors 6502a
Nov 30, 2013
940
441
US
Batteries are unpredictable and surely non linear. My XR had >100% until 175 cycles, then dropped by 300 cycles to 85% and has been holding ~85% since then; I am now at over 600 cycles. I leave it on charger over night, always did. Using optimized charging, which does do what is expected (I checked when I had to wake up really early).
 
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