Are We Going To Have To Go Back To Android?

[ITGeek]

Yes, I know about that. Mine was actually fine for the first few days, maybe even a week, after the update. Then it started acting wonky. My wife's was bad right out of the gate, got good, went south again.

Both had been rebooted, after the update was completed, as well.

 

[Old Goat Ninja]

A few weeks ago I had a sudden battery drain. It was extreme, my phone would only last half a day, even on standby. I never figured out why, but it was pretty bad. My phone was constantly on the charger. This lasted about a week. When I updated to 11.4 it went back to normal. No idea if it was the update, coincidence, or what, but for a week I had bad battery drain that came out of nowhere, there was no update, etc., that started it.

 

[ITGeek]

Looks like my wife's phone is back to normal after running it to shutdown, once, as well. We'll each have to go a week or two, through several routine run/charge cycles, to know for sure. (We usually throw 'em on the charger at night, before going to bed, if they're at or below 70%. Then they come off the charger the following morning.)

 

[carolineM]

Throwing them is never a good idea!

 

[NCzerniak83]

I don't ever use cheap anything. We have third-party charging cords for in the car, but, in the house they're all stock Apple cables that came with the devices.

“Cheap” wasn’t necessarily the keyword. The fact that they are third party is the important part. Even if just in the car, using Lightning cables that are not official Apple Lightning cables can cause surges. The first unit to become damaged is usually the charging chip in the Lightning port, but even if the charging chip avoids damage, the surge can also damage any number of other internal parts, from the processor to the battery itself.

So while you might be saving a tiny amount of money on third party Lightning cables, you will end up with battery life dwindling (as it apparently is), and may even end up with a repair bill for hundreds. It’s not worth saving a few bucks in my opinion.

That's entirely incorrect for modern mobile devices. That has not been true for years.

The myth you’re talking about is that newer devices can overcharge. They can’t. But that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the fact that modern devices do gradually reduce the amount of current as the phone approaches 100%. BUT, both heat and a high charging voltage (above 80%) will still cause lithium-ion batteries to age faster.

This is precisely why the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 batteries were exploding. People were leaving them plugged in all night, keeping the lithium-ion chemical components in a high-tension state for hours overnight.

So just do the math: leaving your battery in it’s highest tension state all night every night is most likely why—or at least a major part of why—your batteries aren’t holding up very well. It’s best to keep it between 30% and 80%, but once lithium-ion is eroded, it can’t be restored. So it won’t get any better, but you can minimize the rate in which it happens from now on.

 

[J. A.]

Leaving your device plugged in all night is certainly not the reason why it’s battery is degrading faster than it should, or else all my iDevices wouldn’t last very long without charging. As soon as the battery is charged completely, the iPhone stops charging. It’s not in it’s highest tension state the whole time.

What really makes the battery degrade faster, are high temperatures.

When to charge your iPhone or iPad | Communities
Charging Your Phone Overnight: Battery Myths Debunked

 

[ITGeek]

“Cheap” wasn’t necessarily the keyword. The fact that they are third party is the important part.

So the fact that they're Apple Certified is meaningless?

The myth you’re talking about is that newer devices can overcharge. They can’t. But that’s not what I’m talking about.

That was exactly what you were talking about. "... don’t ever leave it plugged in all night" was what you wrote.

... both heat and a high charging voltage (above 80%) will still cause lithium-ion batteries to age faster.

What does "high charging voltage (above 80%)" mean? 80% of what?

You do understand that for a charger to "push" energy back into a battery, the charging voltage has to exceed the battery's voltage, right?

This is precisely why the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 batteries were exploding. People were leaving them plugged in all night, keeping the lithium-ion chemical components in a high-tension state for hours overnight.

Waitaminute. First you said you weren't talking about the overcharge problem, now you're saying you are talking about the overcharge problem. Which is it?

So just do the math: leaving your battery in it’s highest tension state all night every night is most likely why

What exactly is a battery's "highest tension state?" That is a term that, in decades of electronics and rechargeable battery usage, I've never encountered before. Can you point me to a definition for it?

—or at least a major part of why—your batteries aren’t holding up very well.

I don't think you're reading entirely what I'm writing. The Apple "Battery Health" of the batteries was unchanged, yet runtime suddenly became drastically reduced after the upgrade to 11.4.

It’s best to keep it between 30% and 80%, ...

I think you're talking about charge level. (And I believe that low end should be 40%, not 30%.)

You do realize, I hope, that "charge level" is as much an estimation on the part of the mobile device as anything else, right? These batteries are so "flat" in their charge/discharge voltage levels that the device has to estimate what charge levels are based on "experience."

I've seen this effect with both Android and Apple devices. Suddenly the device run-time takes a nosedive. Sometimes dramatically (as just happened with ours), sometimes not so much. Run it through a "re-learn cycle": Let it run all the way to the bottom, where the battery runs down past the voltage "knee" in its discharge profile, and the device re-learns what capacity the battery really has.

You can see it in action: Device drops uncommonly fast until it hits somewhere in the 6% range or lower, then hangs on there forever in a day.

Leaving your device plugged in all night is certainly not the reason why it’s battery is degrading faster than it should, or else all my iDevices wouldn’t last very long without charging.

Same here.

I do the same thing with my iThings I did with my Android things: Charge when it gets to about 70% or lower, no lower than 40%, if I can avoid it. Otherwise don't get all anxious about it.

Anyway...

My phone was fixed by a battery capacity re-learn cycle. My wife's appeared to be, at first, then it went back to it's bad new old ways. Did a capacity re-learn cycle again and it was fixed again. We'll have to see if it sticks. If not: Despite the fact the battery health thing claims 97%, we may have to replace her battery sooner, rather than later.

In the meantime: I've updated to 11.4.1 and my runtime is still normal. This time I'm going to run that a couple weeks before subjecting my wife's phone to it.

 

[Mark1112]

Reboot, or do a complete reset. I've had to do it, a hand full time in the years I been running on IOS. Phones are pretty damn good. But not perfect

 

[ITGeek]

Reboot, or do a complete reset.

I had of course tried rebooting. Both. A couple times. A reset would've been the second from the last resort.

So far the update to 11.4.1 seems to have done the trick for her phone. I've applied it to mine, too.

 

[Ledsteplin]

1. The big 3 battery users are Screen brightness, push notifications, and location services. This is the best places to start when a battery is discharging too fast. Make adjustments to these.
2. After an OS update, apps need time to adjust. This will cause increase in battery consumption. It last usually a few days.
3. Leaving the device charging overnight will not cause excess battery usage. When plugged in, the device only uses power from the outlet it's plugged in to.
4. Bluetooth and Background App Refresh do not use much battery. Background App Refresh is actually helpful.
5. What you do on your device can play a big part in battery use. Some apps use a lot. When checking the list in settlngs > Battery, keep in mind that because an app is at the top, it doesn't necessarily mean it's a battery hog. It may just mean you use the app a lot. If you suspect apps running wild, try swiping the suspects out of multitasking, then do a hard reset (reboot). That usually works for me.

 

[Atomic77]

I think apple fixed battery issues with the update to iOS 12. Most iPhones should be on iOS 12.1.2 by now.