iPhone XR ~75-25% batt cycling, ~2yr results with a ‘custom optimization’ on an XR

[reppans]

Initial ‘battery benchmarking’ when brand new:

Today under similar use conditions (mostly wifi as my phone+BT keyboard is also my ‘home computer’):

Apple’s battery optimization is OK if you tend to use 100% batt/day, but IMHO, it’s not very good for the battery if you use significantly less. I understand most folks won’t bother with the ~10sec it takes to manually adjust phone/light/USB timers to control charge time, but what if you could fully automate a ‘custom battery optimization’ with a $10 smart plug? FWIW, I recommend Battery University for best care practices.

So many threads complaining about batteries and runtime - this may be one small/easy step to improve the situation. Hope it can help some folks.

 

[gammamonk]

I've been doing this with my 12 Pro since I first got it. The 4 second wait before toggling the smart switch is a good idea, I very often get the "Accessory is not reachable." I'm going to add that wait step and see if that helps.

Thanks for posting this.

 

[BigMcGuire]

The way I see most people using these batteries is that they're so dependent on their device, the device constantly runs out of battery and they're begging for cables/chargers. I know people who are heavy social media users and their 12 Pro Max can go from 100% to 0% several times in a day while I'm lucky to use more more than 25% of my battery in a day.

Does 25%-75% help the battery? Oh definitely - especially if you're going to keep a phone as long as an Xr.

I've been doing 60-80% on my devices (especially my Macs) and I've noticed a massive decrease in battery drop off. My Apple Watch still fell 5% despite doing the 40-80%.

For me, comparing the battery health of my wife's iPhone and my iPhone - the difference is usually pretty minor (we always get the same phone and usually upgrade every year). So, I stand pretty firm in my belief that 25-75% is great, but only if you're going to keep your phone for more than a few years. Under a 2 year timeframe, there isn't going to be a terribly big difference. Hasn't prevented me from doing 60-80 and continuing it. I may even try 25-75.

While I've gotten very used to charging 60-80, would love to leave my phone on the charger and have it stop charging at 75% - just like my Mac does with Al Dente.

 

[cbautis2]

Crazy efficient battery runtime there. Certainly beats the 12 PM average runtime per battery cycle. I heavily used mine today and still have ~10% left of a full charge cycle but only about 10 hours of SOT while yours get 9 hours with 50% of left on the cycle

 

[now i see it]

Following the shallow discharge and charge practice (55-80 or so) will let the battery outlast the phone.
My 5-1/2 year old 6 Plus I use every day, all day long, has 1918 load cycles on the original battery and its health is still over 95% (according to coconutBattery- which can't be right).

 

[Motionblurrr]

The bonus of having a high battery percentage after a while is that in a pinch like going to a concert, camping, being out all day—you can quick charge to 100% for that time and use the long battery life due to the health when you need it

 

[nmeed]

Initial ‘battery benchmarking’ when brand new:

Today under similar use conditions (mostly wifi as my phone+BT keyboard is also my ‘home computer’):

Apple’s battery optimization is OK if you tend to use 100% batt/day, but IMHO, it’s not very good for the battery if you use significantly less. I understand most folks won’t bother with the ~10sec it takes to manually adjust phone/light/USB timers to control charge time, but what if you could fully automate a ‘custom battery optimization’ with a $10 smart plug? FWIW, I recommend Battery University for best care practices.

So many threads complaining about batteries and runtime - this may be one small/easy step to improve the situation. Hope it can help some folks.

Thanks for the tip on the 4 second wait…I’m thinking that’s going to fix my unreachable issue!

 

[nmeed]

Initial ‘battery benchmarking’ when brand new:

Today under similar use conditions (mostly wifi as my phone+BT keyboard is also my ‘home computer’):

Apple’s battery optimization is OK if you tend to use 100% batt/day, but IMHO, it’s not very good for the battery if you use significantly less. I understand most folks won’t bother with the ~10sec it takes to manually adjust phone/light/USB timers to control charge time, but what if you could fully automate a ‘custom battery optimization’ with a $10 smart plug? FWIW, I recommend Battery University for best care practices.

So many threads complaining about batteries and runtime - this may be one small/easy step to improve the situation. Hope it can help some folks.

Could you please post your location settings for system services and background refresh settings?

 

[reppans]

Could you please post your location settings for system services and background refresh settings?

They are mostly on, except the ‘Apple Improvement’ ones, however I keep location services turned off, unless I’m using the GPS to navigate. Background refresh is off, and I tend to force close apps - usually only keep ~half dozen open at a time. I’ve had an app draining power while in the background, and it didn’t even show in the 24hr graph.

 

[cynics]

I'm probably missing something.

You only ever used the 25-75% battery life aka 50% since it was new?

Again, excuse me if I'm mistaken but lets say you used it from 100 to 0% everyday (or other day) and worse case you were down to 80% health. That still leaves you with 30% more life each day then you've been arbitrarily limiting yourself too since it was new.....

Just seems to me you'll be replacing an iPhone eventually that you pretended the battery health was at 50% since day one.

I mean whatever floats your boat and to each their own, but why care about battery health by actively using it like it was bad since the start?

 

[BigMcGuire]

I'm probably missing something.

You only ever used the 25-75% battery life aka 50% since it was new?

Again, excuse me if I'm mistaken but lets say you used it from 100 to 0% everyday (or other day) and worse case you were down to 80% health. That still leaves you with 30% more life each day then you've been arbitrarily limiting yourself too since it was new.....

Just seems to me you'll be replacing an iPhone eventually that you pretended the battery health was at 50% since day one.

I mean whatever floats your boat and to each their own, but why care about battery health by actively using it like it was bad since the start?

I agree. I've had many iPhone iterations to compare my usage vs my wife's usage. She and I always get the same phone for the same duration (1.5-2 years, recently 1 year <cough>). She has a social life, friends, and uses her phone easily 2-3x as much as I do. She doesn't care if she runs down her iPhone battery and uses her device heavily. I can easily pass a day and only use 15-20% charge with normal usage. (She can drain a 12 Pro Max 1.5x a day with heavy use).

End of 1.5-2 years? She might have 50-100 more charge cycles but battery health is within a few % points of each other or identical.

So while 25-75, 40-80, may be better for the battery, you're not going to see a lot of benefit from in within a 2 year usage cycle (from what I've seen). And I use coconutBattery and fill out excel spreadsheets with battery stats because it's a hobby of mine. lol.

 

[reppans]

…then you've been arbitrarily limiting yourself too since it was new.....

I’m not limiting myself - 8hrs/50% batt. is just my natural level of daily usage. If I need more daily SOT, then I’ll just shift the custom optimization to 80-20 or 90-10 cycling and still only plug-in once/day.

..So while 25-75, 40-80, may be better for the battery, you're not going to see a lot of benefit from in within a 2 year..

Yes agreed, within a 2yr upgrade cycle, both this custom 75-25 and Apple’s 100-50 charge optimizations would easily provide my ~8hrs daily avg SOT. The other big caveat is that it really only helps if you use less than 100% batt per day, or it is convenient to plug-in more than once a day.

The ‘benefits’ of using a custom optimization basically accrues to those with longer-term upgrade horizons, while the ‘costs’ are virtually nil (ie, fully automated, just plug-in/forget like anyone else). The best analogy I can think of is a car - lease vs buy decision. I know a speed-freak colleague that only leases cars - he beats/redlines the motor for 3yrs/30k knowing he’s going to swap it for a new one. I just happen to be the purchase type that prefers to take of cars and use them for 10yrs/100k.

Even when we do lease, we’ll still take care of cars, partial due to ‘mechanical empathy’, but also for the bargain-purchase-option to keep a good one. Case in point, so many 12-series owners here complaining about degradation of their rumored new ’cheaper’ batteries - I’m quite happy to have no noticeable degradation after 2 yrs.