iPad Pro Why isn't the battery of the M1 iPad better?

[DMG35]

I just don't really find the battery life of the M1 12.9" really anything to write home about. Its just about the same as the 2020 iPad and I don't see much of a difference. I thought (and I could be totally wrong on this one) that the mini LED screen was supposed to be more power efficient. Also, the M1 battery of the MacBook Pro lasts forevvvvvvvvver. I just thought it would be comparable when it was announced and that maybe Apple was being a little conservative with their battery numbers.

Its honestly just about the same as last years model. Why isn't it miles better with a more efficient chip and better screen technology?

 

[Apple_Robert]

Are you struggling to get through the day on battery?

 

[DMG35]

Are you struggling to get through the day on battery?

Sometimes. I usually have to put it on the charger every day.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Sometimes. I usually have to put it on the charger every day.

Under ideal conditions, Apple says it should get up to 10 hours when on WiFi, which is about what was claimed for my 2020 iPad Pro.

Do you keep the screen brightness past 50%? What about background app refresh? What apps are you mainly using each day?

 

[DMG35]

Under ideal conditions, Apple says it should get up to 10 hours when on WiFi, which is about what was claimed for my 2020 iPad Pro.

Do you keep the screen brightness past 50%? What about background app refresh? What apps are you mainly using each day?

Its not that I don't get what Apple is advertising. I just thought that since the battery life of a product like the M1 MacBook Pro is like 20 hours that we would see something similar with the newer iPad Pro's. My understanding was that Mini LED was more efficient and the M1 is obviously more efficient than the A12Z.

So with those things in play shouldn't we be getting substantially better battery life than the 2020 model?

 

[ian87w]

It would be hard to do a direct comparison to a MacBook like that.
There are more sensors inside an iPad. Each of those use a bit of power. Then there's Pro Motion, which definitely use even more power. The M1's higher performance might offset whatever power savings it has. In the end, the previous Apple A chips are probably already have excellent balance out of performance and power that the M1 with mini LED doesn't give a "significant" improvement in terms of battery life.

This is in contrast with the MacBooks since the M1 is compared against intel chips. The savings are more significantly seen.

 

[lorsl]

I wonder why Safari browsing is taking so much battery life. It's strange in comparison to watching Netflix. I had always the feeling that can't be normal.

 

[WiBu]

The battery in the iPad Pro is about 2/3 the capacity of the MacBook.

 

[DoghouseMike]

Yea, the MacBooks have a much bigger battery, and were running intel chips before, which used A LOT more power, hence the massive improvements to battery life there. iPads have been on Apple chips “forever”, and seem to always be aimed at getting the same/similar battery life between generations, so no real gains from 2018/2020/2021, because the chips were always pretty efficient. Throw in brighter and faster screens, more sensors, potentially cellular modems, etc and it all makes sense.

 

[iPadified]

Sometimes. I usually have to put it on the charger every day.

This is not new for the 2021 iPads. Certain apps takes a lot of power and keeping the screen brightness to 50% is utopia in bright light conditions. When using the iPad Pro 2017/2020, I usually get 4-5h on one charge.

 

[Tsepz]

I just don't really find the battery life of the M1 12.9" really anything to write home about. Its just about the same as the 2020 iPad and I don't see much of a difference. I thought (and I could be totally wrong on this one) that the mini LED screen was supposed to be more power efficient. Also, the M1 battery of the MacBook Pro lasts forevvvvvvvvver. I just thought it would be comparable when it was announced and that maybe Apple was being a little conservative with their battery numbers.

Its honestly just about the same as last years model. Why isn't it miles better with a more efficient chip and better screen technology?

The issue is that in terms of iPad Pro, the M1 chip is not as big of a leap in efficiency versus previous A12X and A12Z chips, but it is a tremendous leap in something like a laptop coming from Intels inefficient chips.

 

[AutomaticApple]

The battery in the iPad Pro is about 2/3 the capacity of the MacBook.

MacBook Air or MacBook Pro?

 

[UBS28]

MacBook Pro has a bigger battery and also only runs at 60hz.

 

[trip1ex]

MBP M1 battery is ~52 watts and the iPad Pro M1 12.9" is ~40 watts.

500 nits brightness vs 600 for Ipad Pro.

2560-by-1600 at 227 ppi vs 2732-by-2048 at 264 ppi

60 hz vs 120 hz

 

[snipr125]

I wonder why Safari browsing is taking so much battery life. It's strange in comparison to watching Netflix. I had always the feeling that can't be normal.

At the moment on iOS/iPad OS 14.6, there seems to be a battery draining issue with safari for some people, especially when browsing Macrumours. I’m getting it with my 12 mini and some other people are getting it on their iPads. Try using another browser like Firefox and see if this helps.

 

[scupking]

I can say the 11 gets awesome battery life! I get a week out of it before needing a charge. Use it about an hour a day a night.

 

[TheRealAlex]

I just don't really find the battery life of the M1 12.9" really anything to write home about. Its just about the same as the 2020 iPad and I don't see much of a difference. I thought (and I could be totally wrong on this one) that the mini LED screen was supposed to be more power efficient. Also, the M1 battery of the MacBook Pro lasts forevvvvvvvvver. I just thought it would be comparable when it was announced and that maybe Apple was being a little conservative with their battery numbers.

Its honestly just about the same as last years model. Why isn't it miles better with a more efficient chip and better screen technology?

Because you were supposed to wait for the M2 OLED versión like everyone else.

 

[scoblep]

You also have to remember that the MacBook‘s increase in battery life came from moving to apple silicon from Intel CPUs that were much more power hungry. The M1 isn‘t a change in architecture from the chips in the previous iPads. They all use apple silicon. M1 is essentially an upgraded A14. So you wouldn’t expect the same drastic increase as you did moving from intel to M1 on the Mac.

 

[1BadManVan]

Its not that I don't get what Apple is advertising. I just thought that since the battery life of a product like the M1 MacBook Pro is like 20 hours that we would see something similar with the newer iPad Pro's. My understanding was that Mini LED was more efficient and the M1 is obviously more efficient than the A12Z.

So with those things in play shouldn't we be getting substantially better battery life than the 2020 model?

You have to remember the MacBooks we’re running power hungry x86 chipsets running much higher wattage. So they got a huge jump in battery life because apple kept the battery size the same for a ultra low power Arm chip Put in place of them.

The A series previously in the iPads were already very low wattage, low power chips. What’s impressive to me is the big power increase and still keeping the same battery life

 

[Plx32]

I wonder if the culprit is not the mini-LED display.

In my experience, if you increase brightness to something more than 70%, the iPad tends to get very warm and the battery drains a lot faster...