iPad Pro **Update: M4 iPad Pro fixed the problem** I was wrong .... iPad sucks ... worst Apple device by far.

[klasma]

You will never have the same battery health as on Mac, because you cannot customise the charging behaviour.

Another reason you will never have the same battery health is that you will never have the same usage of both, since they have different hardware, a different operating system, and different applications.

I’m all for more charging control on the iPad, but the question is how much difference it actually makes in practice. The way to reliably test this is not to compare an iPad with a MacBook, but to test two identical iPads with identical use and different (manually controlled) charging behavior, and/or to do the same with two identical MacBooks.

 

[Digitalguy]

iPads always have optimized charging on so it's incorrect to say they don't have health protection.

They don't.... there was a post on Apple saying they did but that's bs, as it has simply never happened. An iPad will charge to 100% and stay there, as simple as that

 

[FeliApple]

Another reason you will never have the same battery health is that you will never have the same usage of both, since they have different hardware, a different operating system, and different applications.

I’m all for more charging control on the iPad, but the question is how much difference it actually makes in practice. The way to test this is not to compare an iPad with a MacBook, but to test two identical iPads with identical use and different (manually controlled) charging behavior, and/or to do the same with two identical MacBooks.

As far as how much difference it makes in practice, my running theory is that it doesn’t matter.

I have an iPhone 6s with 63% health on iOS 10 after 1200 cycles. Battery life is just like it was when it was new. No difference at all. iPads have far larger batteries. So if it doesn’t matter on iPhones, it will matter even less on iPads.

Sadly, I do not have, and have never had, an iPad on its original iOS version with enough cycles and enough degradation to prove this, so it’s just a theory for now. The iPhone case, however, should be an important enough hint to state with a high degree of confidence that it actually doesn’t matter. If an 1,810 mAh battery doesn’t suffer 7 years later, then why would an 8K mAh battery fare any worse? The closest I’ve seen is a 6th-gen iPad on iOS 12 with impeccable battery life after 4 years, but battery health is at 91% after 630 cycles, so not enough yet to consider it severely degraded.

My 9.7-inch iPad Pro has 84% health after 710 cycles on iOS 12, and there’s no difference in terms of battery life from when it was first forcibly updated to iOS 12, back in September 2019. I have no reason to believe that any further degradation will have a severe impact, but frankly, since it isn’t the original version, I can’t be sure. The best option is that 6th-gen iPad, but it still has a while to reach any meaningful numbers.

Sadly, other people just update, so I haven’t seen any 6 or 7-year-old iPad on its original iOS version with many cycles, and like I said, this will be just a question until I can test that 6th-gen iPad with enough degradation.

 

[Digitalguy]

As far as how much difference it makes in practice, my running theory is that it doesn’t matter.

I have an iPhone 6s with 63% health on iOS 10 after 1200 cycles. Battery life is just like it was when it was new. No difference at all. iPads have far larger batteries. So if it doesn’t matter on iPhones, it will matter even less on iPads.

Sadly, I do not have, and have never had, an iPad on its original iOS version with enough cycles and enough degradation to prove this, so it’s just a theory for now. The iPhone case, however, should be an important enough hint to state with a high degree of confidence that it actually doesn’t matter. If an 1,810 mAh battery doesn’t suffer 7 years later, then why would an 8K mAh battery fare any worse? The closest I’ve seen is a 6th-gen iPad on iOS 12 with impeccable battery life after 4 years, but battery health is at 91% after 630 cycles, so not enough yet to consider it severely degraded.

My 9.7-inch iPad Pro has 84% health after 710 cycles on iOS 12, and there’s no difference in terms of battery life from when it was first forcibly updated to iOS 12, back in September 2019. I have no reason to believe that any further degradation will have a severe impact, but frankly, since it isn’t the original version, I can’t be sure. The best option is that 6th-gen iPad, but it still has a while to reach any meaningful numbers.

Sadly, other people just update, so I haven’t seen any 6 or 7-year-old iPad on its original iOS version with many cycles, and like I said, this will be just a question until I can test that 6th-gen iPad with enough degradation.

As someone who has had many more iPads and probably many more devices (well over 50 between laptops and tablets) I can tell you that it does not matter... if you use them regularly. Contrary to popular belief, and as long as the battery is made of high quality cells, the impact of cycles on battery degradation is very low if the device is used regularly because that avoids extreme voltages (like 0% or 100% charge) for prolonged periods.
So you can have 1000 cycles and over 90% health, depending on how you have made those cycles... And you generally won't be able to notice the difference in battery life between 100% and 90%.
And you can have 20 cycles and 75% life, because the devices has been sitting dead.
And once you go below around 80%, especially with unhealthy cycles, battery degradation will increase exponentially and you will definitely feel the difference (because, again contrary to popular belief, 70-80% battery health does not mean 80% battery life, but more like half the original battery life)

 

[FeliApple]

As someone who has had many more iPads and probably many more devices (well over 50 between laptops and tablets) I can tell you that it does not matter... if you use them regularly. Contrary to popular belief, and as long as the battery is made of high quality cells, the impact of cycles on battery degradation is very low if the device is used regularly because that avoids extreme voltages (like 0% or 100% charge) for prolonged periods.
So you can have 1000 cycles and over 90% health, depending on how you have made those cycles... And you generally won't be able to notice the difference in battery life between 100% and 90%.
And you can have 20 cycles and 75% life, because the devices has been sitting dead.
And once you go below around 80%, especially with unhealthy cycles, battery degradation will increase exponentially and you will definitely feel the difference (because, again contrary to popular belief, 70-80% battery health does not mean 80% battery life, but more like half the original battery life)

I mentioned cycles because typically there is a correlation, but I’m talking exclusively about health: if an iPhone with 1,810 mAh has no battery life impact with 63% health on iOS 10... would an iPad that’s not updated ever see any kind of degradation? If it will, what’s the health requirement? How low does it need to go? Is it 50%? Less than that? Never?

Like I said, my 9.7-inch iPad Pro is at 84% health and there’s no battery life difference to when it was originally forced into iOS 12. I get the exact same numbers.

With fine-tuned efficiency settings... how low does an efficient, original-iOS-version iPad need to go for it to matter? It’s an interesting question, and one that needs a lot of years to reply to. I’m not a heavy enough user to provide an answer. I don’t degrade my devices quickly enough, and I keep them - and use them! - for many years.

That said, with the available information I have, I’m inclined to say never. Never meaning, way beyond its practical lifespan. The original iOS version of an iPad will be a glorified touch-screen photo album and notes recorder before the battery life shows any meaningful degradation. Well, Netflix will probably work because it works on every iOS version, so you can add that, too, but yeah, it will be very limited by then.

But for example, I cannot say that an iPad with 50% health on its original iOS version will be just like-new. I don’t know if the answer is no, and perhaps it only loses a negligible amount of battery life, and I would be inclined to think that’s true, but I don’t know it with absolute certainty, because I’ve never seen an iPad degraded like that on its original iOS version.

 

[currocj]

my year old ipad pro 12.9" M1 (2021) has a sucky 83% capacity... thanks for the tip, sad to see it so low

 

[Allen_Wentz]

It's not an emotional post. These are the facts:
- 16" M1 Max MacBook Pro = 100% battery health
- 13" M2 MacBook Air = 100% battery health
- 12.9 M1 iPad Pro = below 80% battery health

And the reason for this, is that Apple doesn't allow you to manage the charging behavior of the device, like what you can do on Mac.

The iPad Pro really sucks with the way it destroys batteries due to limitations Apple has put in place.

Sorry but you need some science education. You are inappropriately extrapolating your limited experience with one device to mean the entire cohort of many thousands of devices. Then sensationalizing a click-bait headline to go with it.

 

[ignatius345]

It's not an emotional post. These are the facts:
- 16" M1 Max MacBook Pro = 100% battery health
- 13" M2 MacBook Air = 100% battery health
- 12.9 M1 iPad Pro = below 80% battery health

This is a meaningless bit of information without some context of how much each device has actually been used.

If you have a Honda Accord with 165K miles and a Hyundai Accent with 18K miles and the Accord needs some transmission work, you wouldn't conclude that the Accord has a worse transmission.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

I use them alot, especially my 13" M2 MacBook Air gets used also a travel device. The reason why the battery on the M2 MacBook Air is still perfect because I have charging rules implemented in MacOS.

On the M1 12.9 iPad Pro, I cannot do this, which is why the battery health dropped so much in comparison to my M2 MacBook Air.

Your supposition of "which is why the battery health dropped" is pure speculation with no science behind it.

 

[TokyoKiller]

It's not an emotional post. These are the facts:
- 16" M1 Max MacBook Pro = 100% battery health
- 13" M2 MacBook Air = 100% battery health
- 12.9 M1 iPad Pro = below 80% battery health

And the reason for this, is that Apple doesn't allow you to manage the charging behavior of the device, like what you can do on Mac.

The iPad Pro really sucks with the way it destroys batteries due to limitations Apple has put in place.

It sounds to me like you've had this iPad plugged into power constantly and it has damaged the battery. I worked at  retail and saw iPads for 5 years straight that rarely had batteries that needed servicing unless they were poorly maintained with poor charging habits or were shipped with a defective battery.

To me it sounds like you either have a defective battery that will eventually swell and cause the enclosure and display to separate or you've damaged the battery with poor charging habits. You can blame the software and charging system that's built in but I am not kidding when I say were RARELY saw iPads with bad batteries or ones that needed servicing.

It was way more common to see iPhones and Macs with batteries needing service than iPads. Others who have similar experiences can likely attest to the same thing.

 

[Sami13496]

All I can think of is the comic book guy from The Simpsons whenever I see threads like this.

I just thought the same 😂 “Worst […] ever!”.

 

[IG88]

...while the battery of the M1 12.9 iPad Pro already need servicing.

Can you post a screenshot from Coconut Battery?

 

[Sami13496]

The MacBook Air destroys the iPad Pro? It doesn't even have a touchscreen, unlike every other computer since like 2010!

Touchscreen on a laptop is not being better, its being crab.

 

[BanjoDudeAhoy]

I’ve got a 2018 12.9” iPad Pro which (according to coconut battery) seems like it still has its original battery. I bought the iPad used.

The battery health is at 87%.
How that’s even possible, I don’t know, but those are the numbers coconut is giving me.

 

[one more]

iPad is what it is, with all its pluses and minuses. I agree that essentially it is a big iPhone with a much better multitasking, however this is enough for many people.

FWIW, I have been using an iPad and iPhone combo since the original iPad Air, which is a while. I then kept on upgrading them to Air 2, Air 4 and now am using Air 5. Amazing devices (for my needs) and I have never changed a battery in either of them. All of them still work, including the original Air. My secret? Charge them only when needed and don’t keep them plugged in when the battery charge is higher than 90%.

Ironically, the battery of my 2015 MBP swell in the summer 2021 and needed to be swapped, alongside with the keyboard. This set me off about 210€, which was about 1/3 of a new iPad Air price and 1/5 of MBA. 🤷🏻‍♂️

 

[sparksd]

iPad is what it is, with all its pluses and minuses. I agree that essentially it is a big iPhone with a much better multitasking, however this is enough for many people.

FWIW, I have been using an iPad and iPhone combo since the original iPad Air, which is a while. I then kept on upgrading them to Air 2, Air 4 and now am using Air 5. Amazing devices (for my needs) and I have never changed a battery in either of them. All of them still work, including the original Air. My secret? Charge them only when needed and don’t keep them plugged in when the battery charge is higher than 90%.

Ironically, the battery of my 2015 MBP swell in the summer 2021 and needed to be swapped, alongside with the keyboard. This set me off about 210€, which was about 1/3 of a new iPad Air price and 1/5 of MBA. 🤷🏻‍♂️

A lot of people would disagree that it essentially is a big iPhone with a much better multitasking.

 

[Rychiar]

I learned years ago with my air not to leave an iPad plugged in. I love my 12.9 M1 now but I never leave it plugged in

 

[AJB1971]

I find that battery health statistics can vary so I wouldn’t make assumptions based on one reading, especially if I’d recently upgraded the operating system.

I’ve just checked the readings on my iPad Pro M1 and coconutBattery shows 100%, technically it’s 100.88% as it’s over the design capacity, and Powerutil shows 96.51% based on analytics from a few days ago. So that’s a difference of over 4%, which is fairly significant. Both show 53 cycles.
https://www.itecheverything.com/powerutil

 

[Populus]

I usually leave it plugged on the desk. My 2018 iPad Pro never needed a battery replacement in almost five years… but maybe it is better to unplug it every now and then.

 

[cupcakes2000]

essentially it is a big iPhone with a much better multitasking, however this is enough for many people.

This is a bold statement - not to mention stale, overused and drastically incorrect.

Perhaps you can give an inkling as to why you think this? What are your uses of phone, of iPad and traditional system which regulates your iPad to being nothing more than a phone?

 

[FeliApple]

I find that battery health statistics can vary so I wouldn’t make assumptions based on one reading, especially if I’d recently upgraded the operating system.

I’ve just checked the readings on my iPad Pro M1 and coconutBattery shows 100%, technically it’s 100.88% as it’s over the design capacity, and Powerutil shows 96.51% based on analytics from a few days ago. So that’s a difference of over 4%, which is fairly significant. Both show 53 cycles.
https://www.itecheverything.com/powerutil

PowerUtil measures current battery health against the alleged actual initial capacity - MaximumFCC - which is why it’s always lower than other measurements, which compare it to design capacity.

 

[Fuzzball84]

iPad batteries are generally pretty good for longevity... every iPad Ive owned has pretty much had a battery that lasted 4 to 5 years and gave similar performance as new. Granted I don't use it for anything too taxing on the processor..

 

[LeeW]

Anyway guys, have fun spending $$$$$ on these overpriced machines with so many artificial limitations and restrictions put in place by Apple.

I mean you said at the start it was not an emotional post, it's how it ended up if it really didn't start that way.

Aside from anything you gave nothing but 3 battery states from 3 different devices but offered nothing else. There may be a reason. So all you can expect to receive are the replies you got.

 

[one more]

This is a bold statement - not to mention stale, overused and drastically incorrect.

Perhaps you can give an inkling as to why you think this? What are your uses of phone, of iPad and traditional system which regulates your iPad to being nothing more than a phone?

Sure thing - both iPhone and iPad run similarly more limited OSs compared to macOS, it’s a hard fact. Look at the number of people on these forums dreaming about being able to dual-boot their iPad Pros into iPadOS and macOS.

Fair enough, unlike iPhone, iPad also supports a pencil, so can be a great tool for drawing or annotating, but this is where its advantage over a Mac ends. I use iPad for these things - music, movies, web browsing, note taking, simple spreadsheets (Numbers), document writing (Pages), some basic photo and image editing (Pixelmator and Canvas) and very simple Wordpress website updates (in Safari, yet complex layout changes are still working better in macOS).

So yes, I can do anything that can be done on my iPad on my iPhone, just on a much smaller screen, obviously.

iPad is also lighter to carry around than a MacBook, which I do enjoy when travelling for work.

Did I miss anything else?

 

[muzzy996]

Did I miss anything else?

This is the Internet, full of people with their own opinions . . of course you did, but someone will be around shortly to remind you of what you missed. 🤣

Never ceases to amaze me what a ranting thread can do on this forum. Some nice excitement for a Monday !