Podcasts app shows HUGE background activity! Any way to stop it from working in the background?

[Saturn007]

So, when I go to Settings and check Battery, I frequently find certain apps, especially Podcasts and Books, showing lots of time in background activity!

Yet, I have Background Refresh turned off — both in general and for the apps.

For example, just now when I checked, it showed 13 minutes of Podcast time as Screen and 1 hour and 26 minutes in background!

Does that happen because the Podcast is playing, but the screen has gone off?

Or, is it because its trying to update or download podcasts?!

Same question about Books… but in that case, I’m only using the app with the display on, but it is still showing lots of background activity, often more than I’m using it!

How come? And, how can I stop it?!

By the way, this happens even though I’m in Airplane Mode and WiFi is off.

It happens on the iPod Touch 6g as well as the iPhone SE.

 

[now i see it]

Something is definitely messed up because I don’t have any rogue apps running in the background. Maybe get in the habit of force quitting all apps then restarting the phone once a day. Don’t know if that makes a difference.

 

[snyp1193]

This is happening on other apps like News, Mail, Photos as well. High background usage draining battery even though Background Refresh is off and the app is closed/suspended. Likely iOS 15 bug. You have to force quit all apps and restart your phone to fix this. I've done it multiple times per week and its getting annoying.

 

[autumnpatchouli]

Over the last 10 days Podcasts app used nearly 7 hours of background, Music used 5 hours, and most of the others apps used about 30 minutes. All had background activity turned OFF.

Last year, my wife took my 11ProMax that I had for a year. Battery health was 100%. It’s still at 97%. My 12 ProMax, which I have now had for a year is at 95%. I get that these are not really super accurate measurements, but either this phone, or iOS 15 is chewing up battery.

I used Google podcast app when Apple screwed up the native app earlier this year. I don’t remember it using anything near what native app is using now. Maybe I’ll just switch until Apple deems it appropriate to address this issue.

 

[now i see it]

Other people are complaining about this in the iOS 15 section. It’s an iOS 15 bug. iOS 14 doesn’t do this.

 

[kiancheong]

This has been ongoing for me since the start of iOS 15 beta on my 11 Pro.

It began with the built-in Music app running in the background for no obvious reasons (usually when I am asleep). So I deleted the app. Lo and behold, now I have "Recently Deleted Apps" showing up instead!

A few days later after I deleted the Music app, the Translate app decided to copy what Music was doing and chew up battery in the background as well. So off to the bin it goes.

I thought it was due to the beta, so filed a radar with the Feedback app. The case is still open.

Fast forward to my new iPhone 13 Pro: I was on iOS 15.2 beta, so had to do a wireless restore to move my data over. For the first few days of usage, every thing was fine. Then this strange background activity cropped up again. So I decided to run a test.

Since I still have my 11 Pro with me, I decided to do a full factory reset of the device with no apps other than signing in to my iCloud account. No background activity at all.

With that in mind, I decided to do the same with the 13 Pro: full factory reset and reinstall every app one by one. Everything was fine again, until about 3 days later: Music app decides to go rogue again.

One thing I noticed was that the rogue apps will only go rogue when I am home with the device on wi-fi and cellular. When I'm outside, there is no such issue. So I thought I'd switch off wi-fi while home and guess what: problem fixed! The moment I have wi-fi back on again, Music will go rogue.

I'm currently waiting for iOS 15.2 to be released and will be back investigating this again. But my fix for now is to disable wi-fi when home and only having it on while the device is charging.

The radar that I submitted has "more than 10 recent similar reports" but it looks like no solution has been found yet.

 

[now i see it]

Maybe it’s the reporting that’s screwed up and the apps aren’t running in the background at all…
iOS 15 still has disc capacity reporting errors. No reason to expect that background activity reporting is accurate either.

 

[kiancheong]

Maybe it’s the reporting that’s screwed up and the apps aren’t running in the background at all…
iOS 15 still has disc capacity reporting errors. No reason to expect that background activity reporting is accurate either.

I wish it was, but the device was slightly warm and I can see battery percentage go down.

As an example, with wi-fi on and the rogue apps running in the background, I noticed the battery go from 100% before bed to about 60% when I wake up in the morning.

With my current fix, the battery remains at 100% (sometimes 1 or 2% below) when I wake up.

 

[Saturn007]

I've experienced the same battery drain and back of iPad getting quite warm.

If only Apple had shown me that I had a choice of iOS 14.8.1 or iOS 15.1 in iTunes when I connected via USB, which is how I update my devices, I would have stayed on iOS 14.

If Apple lets users get security updates and stay at 14 via WiFi, then they should have done that via iTunes, too. In fact, they should let all of us roll back to 14.8,1 if we choose to!

 

[kiancheong]

15.2 RC seems to have fixed the issue. I no longer see this issue with wi-fi and cellular on while at home.

On my iPad, the Mail app was running in the background constantly after installing 15.2 RC. I did the Volume Up, Volume Down followed by a long press of the Top button until the Apple logo appears and that seems to have fixed it.

 

[Saturn007]

What's RC? Some beta version?

Or, Royal Crown Cola?!?

 

[kiancheong]

Release Candidate

 

[kiancheong]

15.2 RC seems to have fixed the issue. I no longer see this issue with wi-fi and cellular on while at home.

On my iPad, the Mail app was running in the background constantly after installing 15.2 RC. I did the Volume Up, Volume Down followed by a long press of the Top button until the Apple logo appears and that seems to have fixed it.

Looks like I might have spoken too soon, Music is back to its old self on my iPhone. The Volume Up, Down trick seems to have stopped it for an hour or so.

Back to having Wi-Fi disabled I guess.

 

[Saturn007]

Any difference between a beta version and a “release candidate”?

Does that mean a pending one — on the verge of release? Can there be more iterations of it before it is actually released?

When does something transition from being simply a beta to being an RC?