2020 iPhones Could Have Larger Batteries Due to Tweaked Circuitry

[tech3475]

I may be the minority here. But I wish they make them thinner and lighter.
The phones have gradually gotten heavier the last few years and I don’t like it.

I find them thin enough, although I was surprised by the weight of my dads XR (8 plus owner).

Personally, I wouldn't mind a switch to plastic, but it seemed to be a common complaint back when Samsung did it. Never bothered me though and I always keep my phone in a case.

 

[JulianL]

I may be the minority here. But I wish they make them thinner and lighter.
The phones have gradually gotten heavier the last few years and I don’t like it.

On thickness aren’t these high-spec cameras becoming an issue now, requiring a certain minimum depth to get the necessary optics in there, so reducing thickness of the main body might just mean an even more prominent camera bump? I know there are things like periscope cameras that could lay sideways but I believe they are more expensive; I’m not sure how much more expensive or if they would be practical. Also, lying sideways, they would take out space from the battery in what would be an already thinner case.

On weight I agree with you. I understand why wireless charging means Apple can’t do a metal back any more but I worry about the rumours that iPhone 2020 will go back to a glass back because glass is heavy. One thing I liked when I went from my iPhone 4 to an iPhone 5 was how much lighter the 5 was due to no glass back. I wonder whether Apple could do something with carbon fibre or some other material for the back because if they go glass then the 2020 iPhone might get even heavier than the current iPhone Pros.

 

[coolfactor]

120 Hz displays demand more battery power. Bigger QHD displays, really HIGH resolution cameras with powerful GPU, NPU, bigger RAM definitely need more processing power...Apple tried its best to deny this so long! RAM is another area!! But cleverly they have anticipated this and increased the prices in advance so that they can provide value by slowly introducing these without having to increase the prices since most or all of these are just normal improvements than radical innovations...

As a software engineer, I understand the realities around RAM usage. Give developers more RAM and they get LAZY! They stop optimizing. I appreciate that Apple has created an environment that encourages and requires optimization.

I speak from experience. My own web applications framework does 100x what it did 10 years ago, and uses 1/10th of the memory because optimization is part of the development process, not some optional add-on that comes later.

I hope that Apple doesn't give into demands for more RAM from spec-hungry consumers. Pure performance is more important.

 

[I7guy]

...But cleverly they have anticipated this and increased the prices in advance so that they can provide value by slowly introducing these without having to increase the prices since most or all of these are just normal improvements than radical innovations...

Correct. Starting with the iPhone 1 at $699. Yep, in 12 years the price has basically doubled.

 

[Jaspers dog]

I have to say that I have seen a SUBSTANTIAL increase in battery life from my Xs to my 11 Pro. Much more than Apple quoted or the usual year to year increase.

Whereas last year I might have ended they in the low 20 percent I now usually got to bed on about 45-55 percent. Similar usage obviously.

 

[BigDO]

5g is all that really matters.

To whom?

 

[Aditya rathee]

I

And please add 25w adapter in the box

i think it is discontinued now
30w is available now & it would be great if they bundle it in box

 

[JulianL]

I have to say that I have seen a SUBSTANTIAL increase in battery life from my Xs to my 11 Pro. Much more than Apple quoted or the usual year to year increase.

Whereas last year I might have ended they in the low 20 percent I now usually got to bed on about 45-55 percent. Similar usage obviously.

Likewise. I’m really impressed by what Apple did this year. The difference is so dramatic that, with so many people disappointed with the 2019 iPhone refresh, I actually think I’d rank it as my favourite year-on-year upgrade ever simply because battery life on my 11 Pro is totally transformed vs my Xs. It is making me realise how disappointing the battery life on my 11” iPad Pro is though. I really hope that some of these rumoured new components and other battery life improvements also make it into the 2020 iPads.

 

[miniyou64]

I wish I could use an 11 Pro but unfortunately Apple’s OLED implementation burns my eyes out

 

[nikusak]

Correct. Starting with the iPhone 1 at $699. Yep, in 12 years the price has basically doubled.

The “best” iPhone has never been sold at $350. Not even close.

You have pretty much always ended up paying at least $600 or so. Maybe $199 or whatever at first and the rest in monthly payments to carrier.

(iPhone ASP has gone up from ~$600 to somewhere around $750-800. It’s all in the financial reports. Or used to be, not anymore since they don’t release unit sales anymore.)

 

[V_Man]

The more battery the better.

 

[iSayuSay]

It would be cool to have a phone where no matter what you did with it, the battery never ran out within a day.

But 5G radio also sips more power compared to LTE. You have a big, beautiful dream, but won't be fulfilled in the near future, I'm afraid.

 

[Atlantico]

Sure, the *could* have a bigger battery because of tweaked circuitry, or they could make the iPhone even thinner.

This is Apple, I know what I'm putting my money on

 

[recoil80]

They'll likely keep the same battery life as 5G and better displays require more power. My wife's iPhone 11 has a great battery life and that's the only thing I don't like about my Xs

 

[UltimaKilo]

Consumers are going to need it due to 5G. Hopefully they can further reduce battery consumption through other means. Soon people will realize how over-hyped 5G is and we’re still 2+ years away from its max potential.

 

[Jaspers dog]

Likewise. I’m really impressed by what Apple did this year.

I wonder how much of it is optimisation of software as well. Using GPS navigation used to hammer my Xs and earlier iPhones but hardly dents my 11 Pro battery.

Going off on a connected tangent I've had my 16 inch Macbook Pro for a couple of weeks now and I'm really disappointed with the battery life. I'm getting 2.5 hours shooting tethered which is only a notch up on my 2012 15 inch.

 

[Jandalf]

Sounds good, but the more advanced the phone, the more power consumption there will be.
Same equasion since years, but hey: they will keep up a very good battery life (from my usage-point-of-view) even with new technologies like 5G.
good!

 

[meady100]

I may be the minority here. But I wish they make them thinner and lighter.
The phones have gradually gotten heavier the last few years and I don’t like it.

You're not alone. Everyone seems so happy about bigger and heavier batteries. Not me. After a while of borrowing an XR, going back to my iPhone6 was bliss - it feels like a delicious light wafer in the hand.

 

[JulianL]

But 5G radio also sips more power compared to LTE. You have a big, beautiful dream, but won't be fulfilled in the near future, I'm afraid.

When the world started moving from 3G to 4G I used the setting to disable 4G so my phone kept on using 3G. In fact I’m pretty sure I did the same thing when 3G first came out and I disabled it so that my phone was locked to 2G.

Given that I am perfectly happy with LTE (I get no where near needing even LTE-levels of bandwidth) then as long as Apple again has a toggle in settings to disable 5G I will almost certainly adopt the same tactic again and keep 5G disabled. They’re not going to switch off 4G when 5G rolls out I assume.

 

[MoreRumors?]

With the space saved, it's good that an increase in battery capacity is considered and good news for those who use their phones a lot.
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Not needed with all day battery life.Charging can be done overnight,or whatever time your sleeping pattern is.People are too obsessed with fast charging.
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Well,if you can’t make the current 11 Pro Max last all day,then you have an addiction problem and need to put it down for a while.

Not every one charge overnight because there may be sufficient battery life and end up charging at different time the following day which is where the fast charger can come in handy. Everyone use their phones differently, so may need fast charging and some may not need ti.

 

[Grey Area]

As a software engineer, I understand the realities around RAM usage. Give developers more RAM and they get LAZY! They stop optimizing. I appreciate that Apple has created an environment that encourages and requires optimization.
(...)
I hope that Apple doesn't give into demands for more RAM from spec-hungry consumers. Pure performance is more important.

There are limits to what optimization can do to deal with low RAM. Sooner or later one hits the wall, and then optimizing turns into workarounds. I'm mostly with you on developer laziness and software bloat (though there is something to be said for utilizing large established 3rd-party libraries rather than reinventing the wheel and introducing new exciting problems). But I do not think limiting hardware is the way to combat laziness. Let the users decide. If app B does the same thing as A without crawling to a halt, people will switch, and the devs of A may learn.

 

[Vjosullivan]

Wow 2020 is shaping up to be one heck of an upgrade.

The "upgrade" in this case is getting rid of the Lightning port and moving to wireless charging only. Once that's done your requirement for a battery protection circuit is much reduced.

Now all you need to do is to add the wireless charging pad to stuff you carry around to keep everything charged. (And maybe a wireless dongle adapter, too.)
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This is apple, not a Chinese rip-off trying to impress with higher numbers for the sake of it.

Apple have never been above using numbers to impress. They spend approximately $2,000,000,000 a year on marketing to impress (or do you think iPhones sell themselves).

 

[azentropy]

“make the apps default to the bottom?”

What does that mean?

I think it means that apps on the home screen default to be displayed/lined up starting at bottom row of the screen rather than the top row. Example on a new page if you add a new app it adds it to the top left of the screen. Instead an option that a new app would be added to the bottom left of the screen instead. This would make it much easier for one handed users (and really all users) to use without having to use reachability etc. An option would be nice.

 

[MattMJB0188]

iPhone 8 design with 5G is all we want.

 

[DoctorTech]

Hopefully the future iPhones will be thick enough to get rid of the camera bump.

A quick DuckDuckGo yielded search result estimates of 75% - 87% of smartphone users put cases on their phones. Those estimates were a couple of years old so if anything, they seem a little low compared to my personal observations (I teach Operations Management and Data Analytics for a Big 10 University and I've seen literally hundreds of smart phones in the hands of students over the past few semesters).

I realize if you don't use a case, the camera bump would be rather annoying but I always put a case on my phone for protection and it gives me the added benefit of solving the camera bump problem.