iPad Pro Battery Life

Hardware Reviews
1

Ok, my new 11” iPad Pro M2 version is my 3rd iPad. I had the second edition of the iPad and the iPad Air 2 before it. I guess I technically worked on the first edition iPad for 7-8 months from work, but it wasn’t mine.

One thing that my previous iPads had in common was really good battery life. I mean, with my iPad Air 2, I probably charged that thing every 3-4 days and could expect it to last quite a while, and that’s taking into consideration it was on a Bluetooth keyboard case, which I used extensively. If I ran into an issue, I could typically just plug it into one of my external batteries (they are typically around 10,000 MaH or what not, USB A).

I don’t get nearly the battery life from my new iPad. In fact, I overslept (until about 7 this morning), unplugged my iPad around 7:45, read for about a half hour (Books, highlighting areas I want to explore or write about), did a little email, set it down for a while, then at 9 I picked it back up and journaled for about 30 minutes. Since then, I’ve reviewed email (responding as needed), poked around Reddit, and am now here asking this question. With that time, my battery is down to 81% right now. I find myself charging/recharging at least 1-2 times a day.

One of the nice things about the previous version iPads was that I could EXPECT multiple days of use. Yesterday, I tried to go most of the day as an experiment, not using it all day necessarily, but just poking around with it. As it stands now, by 7:30pm last night, I had to plug it in as I’d gotten below 10% of my battery.

Should I adjust some settings or be concerned that maybe the battery in this unit is faulty? I’m really not doing a lot on it right now, but will likely be doing more as my holiday/vacation comes to an end next week.

Thoughts?

2

I think in order to get optimal battery life you really need to keep your screen brightness down below 50 or 40%. It’s not a problem for me because I am really comfortable having my screen at about 35 to 40% that said even at that screen brightness, I probably barely get 8 to 10 hours a day. It’s hard for me to estimate because I’ve never really kept careful track as I’m always near an outlet with my charger. I tend not to think about it too much and just plug-in for a bit once during the day and then again, in the evening.

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3

I’ve turned off most apps for “Background App Refresh” as seen in the example screenshots below. I’m getting ~10 hours of continuous use on my iPad Pro 12.9 M1.

Screenshot 2022-12-28 at 2.05.31 PM
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Screenshot 2022-12-28 at 2.05.36 PM
Screenshot 2022-12-28 at 2.05.36 PM1920×1439 88.1 KB

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4

my iPad mini 6 has the worst battery life. I had to run a shortcut to turn the low power mode on overnight. I do not want to suffer performance issue or read in reduced brightness during the day when I use it. Still I have to charge it every day briefly to keep it about 40%

5

Ok, big thanks to everyone who commented. I’ve turned down the screen, which I’m very comfortable with - it’s a bright screen so if I do ever need it brighter, I can just adjust it then turn it back. I’ve also disabled most of the background refreshing that was occurring. I topped off the battery a bit ago, so we will see if this has an impact.

I get that I may have to charge it daily or what not, but I’d really love to have faith that my battery will last the better part of a day without having to worry about charging - especially since I can’t seem to just pop this on an external battery… I trued using a USB A to C adapter and charging it with my regular external battery and got no love.

On to this new experiment!

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6

Please do let us know how this progresses, eh? :slight_smile:

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7

I will. Thank you! This is a new learning curve with this new iPad.

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8

Do you keep an Apple Pencil attached? When I do, it significantly shortens battery life.

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9

Sometimes. Now that I’ve changed the settings… in the last 20 minutes with the pencil off the case and the settings changed, I’m still at 100%. So perhaps that was part of the problem. I’ll be experimenting a bit over the next day or two and will report back.

For example, last night I went to bed and the iPad was charged to 100%, so I left it sitting on the table in its closed case with the pencil attached. When I woke, it was down to 95%. But when I started using it, after a half hour or so of reading and some light Reddit browsing with pencil in hand, the iPad battery was down to like 83%

As I get a handle on this, I’ll be sure to update here.

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10

I too would like to know the impact of having the pencil attached. I keep mine attached all the time but if there is meaningful battery savings by keeping it off of the iPad I’ll change my habit.

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11

This should be easy to work out: Charge the iPad and Pencil to 100%; attach the Pencil; let the iPad sit for n hours and note the battery drop. Then repreat without the Pencil attachd.

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12

I’ll try that but right now I’m still neck deep on trying to fix my AN problem. :frowning:

I’m wondering about deleting this file.

13

I’m not sure I trust the iPad battery percentage measurement.

The first 10% seems to last waaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyy longer than the last 10%.

I say “seems to” because I’ve not measured it.

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14

Even if thats the case, you’ll be measuring drop over the same range and should have a pretty clear indication after an hour or so as to whether the Pencil has a significant effect. I’ll give this a try if I can ever find a couple of hours that I don’t use my iPad :wink:

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15

Each of my iPads (ipad 1, ipad 3, iPad Pro 9.7”, iPad Pro 12.9 (2nd Gen)” and the iPad Pro 11 latest version.) has had a battery life of about 10 hours. I’ve not seen that the latest ipad battery life is any worse than a previous edition.

What does the settings app say is using all of your battery life?

16

As I recall, the battery meter on Apple devices does not show an actual measurement, only a calculation.

17

I’ve just finished testing the potential impact of the Pencil on iPad battery life. I fully charged my iPad Pro (2018 11") and Pencil and then unplugged the iPad and let it sit closed. After three hours the battery for both devices are still showing as being 100% charged.

I think it’s safe to conclude that simply leaving the Pencil charging does not significantly impact iPad battery life.

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18

I’ve run a similar experiment over days, not hours. Charged up my iPad and let it sit (asleep, no use) with and without the pencil. There is a noticeable impact. I’m not a heavy iPad user, so I don’t need to charge daily. If you are charging daily due to heavy use, then no, the pencil will not have a noticeable impact. But if you are lightly using the iPad and are used to long battery life, then the slow drain of your iPad battery to the pencil battery will be noticeable and you will have to charge more frequently. In general, with the pencil attached I have to charge every 1-2 days. With the pencil unattached I can easily get away with charging every 4-5 days.

This tells me that there won’t be a large impact on battery over three hours, but there will be an impact if the pencil is attached all day. Will it make your iPad battery go to zero? No. But your battery will not have as much life after a full day of topping up the pencil than if you used it all day without the pencil attached and charging. The pencil is drawing energy from the iPad battery. That will affect battery life. The draw per hour is likely small, but over many hours that draw will add up and will show up in the iPad battery life.

Edit to add: There is an additional consideration - Apple Pencil battery life. If you leave the pencil unattached, you need to keep an eye on charge level. Li-ion batteries don’t age well if they get completely discharged a lot. The apple battery is small, so it will drop to zero quickly if you leave it in a drawer or bag instead of attached and charging. The pencil isn’t cheap, so there is a balance to consider between optimizing iPad battery life and maintaining pencil battery health.

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19

Very interesting. I use my iPad a lot and I always have the pencil attached. I think I will keep the pencil in the briefcase and only pull it out and charge it when needed. I don’t use it that often. Thanks for the follow up on this.

20

I tried to discharge my Apple Pencil without using it (long story) and it took 10 days