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iPhone 6(S)/Plus 9 Months Post Battery Service - Throttling

Kognito

Kognito

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jul 27, 2011
145
258
Had my 6S battery swapped out by Apple near exactly 9 months ago now and tonight, after a very sudden loss of battery charge % - I got the full iOS <10.2 experience. Hello Unexpected Shutdown, my old friend.

Needless to say, checking the battery page after the phone rebooted un-aided after 20 seconds, I'm being throttled. Battery health at 92% and I'm throttled to 600Mhz. Sure, I could disable it and deal with the erratic battery drops and shutdowns that will creep in at increasingly higher percentages, but is this really acceptable?

During the throttling scandal, plenty came out in support of Apple saying that people with 'old' devices should expect the batteries to be degraded after 2+ years, that Apple was doing everyone a solid with the throttling. But 9 months? Is that the shelf life of an iPhone battery? They're not exactly user replaceable - so this then begs the question, is this the shelf life of an iPhone? Always kept my Apple devices for at least 2 generations and I've never had an issue like I have with this 6S.

I'm thankful that I live in the UK and the consumer protection laws are there such that Apple is obligated to replace the battery as defective, but I know that not everyone is covered by such laws. Who knows, maybe I got a dud? But this behaviour being exactly what I experienced with this device before I had the battery swapped out doesn't give me much hope.

Anyway, I'll be making a trip to the local Apple Store next week but thought I'd post this here as I'd been looking in the past for posts that reported what battery health was for people when they started getting throttled. I'm sure it varies wildly, but I was not expecting this to kick in at 92% health.
 
A lot of it depends on your usage and how you treat your battery, but that sounds pretty short life for a battery.

The name of the game is cycle counts - how many times you discharge and recharge your battery are the main culprits of battery wear and destruction.

Best of luck getting it fixed and replaced.
 
I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a light user, but then again I'm not exactly doing anything crazy with the phone either.

Looking at my last 7 days usage, the only app that has used double digits of battery percentage is Safari (28%) which I use a couple of times a day, though a 6S is far from an ideal browsing experience so save most of my browsing for the iPad or Mac. Everything else I use on a regular basis, Messages, Twitter, Overcast, News, Spotify, Reddit, all coming in at between 3-7% each. I'm not exactly the type to drain the battery multiple times per day playing Subway Surfers or whatever is popular these days.

Disappointing, but I'm fairly hopeful there won't be an issue getting it replaced
 
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It sounds like a defective battery since 9 months is too short. Does it work better while charging it? If so I have suggestions on ways to charge it when out on the move.
 
Kognito said:
Had my 6S battery swapped out by Apple near exactly 9 months ago now and tonight, after a very sudden loss of battery charge % - I got the full iOS <10.2 experience. Hello Unexpected Shutdown, my old friend.

Needless to say, checking the battery page after the phone rebooted un-aided after 20 seconds, I'm being throttled. Battery health at 92% and I'm throttled to 600Mhz. Sure, I could disable it and deal with the erratic battery drops and shutdowns that will creep in at increasingly higher percentages, but is this really acceptable?

During the throttling scandal, plenty came out in support of Apple saying that people with 'old' devices should expect the batteries to be degraded after 2+ years, that Apple was doing everyone a solid with the throttling. But 9 months? Is that the shelf life of an iPhone battery? They're not exactly user replaceable - so this then begs the question, is this the shelf life of an iPhone? Always kept my Apple devices for at least 2 generations and I've never had an issue like I have with this 6S.

I'm thankful that I live in the UK and the consumer protection laws are there such that Apple is obligated to replace the battery as defective, but I know that not everyone is covered by such laws. Who knows, maybe I got a dud? But this behaviour being exactly what I experienced with this device before I had the battery swapped out doesn't give me much hope.

Anyway, I'll be making a trip to the local Apple Store next week but thought I'd post this here as I'd been looking in the past for posts that reported what battery health was for people when they started getting throttled. I'm sure it varies wildly, but I was not expecting this to kick in at 92% health.
Click to expand...

Sounds like this should be a warranty repair, that said, I believe Apple only provides a 90 day warranty for repairs. I'd still take it in and demo this to a 'genius'.
 
Perhaps an iPad would help productivity in the interim.
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TiggrToo said:
Sounds like this should be a warranty repair, that said, I believe Apple only provides a 90 day warranty for repairs. I'd still take it in and demo this to a 'genius'.
Click to expand...
I would think that the battery would have a 1 year warranty
 
As said above, cycles are the important metric when looking at longevity.

You compare the cycle count with the capacity and can pretty quickly determine if the battery is faulty or exhausted.
 
Battery health at 92% within 9 months is pretty alarming. This just means that your cycle count is really high. Do you manage to discharge the battery multiple times everyday?
 
So, I've got 314 cycles on the battery according to Coconut battery, which equates to an average 1.16 charge cycles per day since the new battery was installed. I don't know how that compares with others here, but I'd imagine 1 charge cycle per day is pretty normal for most?
 
Kognito said:
So, I've got 314 cycles on the battery according to Coconut battery, which equates to an average 1.16 charge cycles per day since the new battery was installed. I don't know how that compares with others here, but I'd imagine 1 charge cycle per day is pretty normal for most?
Click to expand...

If this was normal everyone's battery would be near dead at the end of the day. My X usually gets put on the charger with about 50% remaining so it would take two work days to equal a full cycle. Most people's battery in not dead at the end of the day. Your usage would be considered to be HEAVY.
 
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92% after 314 cycles is within the range that Apple defines to be normal enough to not require free service or warranty of any sort.

With this usage Apple will probably allow you to buy a fresh battery at their regular price every 6-12 months or so.

Apple considers a battery defective if in less than 500 cycles it dips to 80% or below.
 
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Newtons Apple said:
If this was normal everyone's battery would be near dead at the end of the day. My X usually gets put on the charger with about 50% remaining so it would take two work days to equal a full cycle. Most people's battery in not dead at the end of the day. Your usage would be considered to be HEAVY.
Click to expand...

That's interesting. I'd say I usually get through the day with ~20% left though heavier days when I do have to use Maps or something similar, it can complete more than one cycle, hence my cycle count being up. Worth noting when comparing to your X that the battery on the 6S is way smaller and isn't rated for nearly as much usage as you can get out of the X. Doesn't surprise me that you can get through a day with 50% left.

aakshey said:
92% after 314 cycles is within the range that Apple defines to be normal enough to not require free service or warranty of any sort.
Click to expand...

The percentage itself is fine, it's in line with what I'd expect. However, the battery failing to provide enough power and causing unexpected shutdowns at this level of degradation is not what I'd expect, nor what Apple Support seemed to expect when I talked to them. It may not be covered under warranty, but it's covered under local purchase protection laws, so I'm hopeful I won't have an issue getting it replaced. We will see.
 
Over one cycle a day is quite heavy. My 6s on iOS 9 gives me 8 hours of usage and I finish the day with about 35-50% depending on how much I use it during that day.
 
FeliApple said:
Over one cycle a day is quite heavy. My 6s on iOS 9 gives me 8 hours of usage and I finish the day with about 35-50% depending on how much I use it during that day.
Click to expand...

You won’t get 8 hrs on iOS 11. 5-6 hrs tops.

I’ve seen two iPhone 7 end up with like 6 hrs per day with 90% battery health. And a brand new SE battery barely making to 7 hrs before going to 0%.

iOS 12 might change that. But for now battery life on iOS 12 for me is much worse.
 
aakshey said:
You won’t get 8 hrs on iOS 11. 5-6 hrs tops.

I’ve seen two iPhone 7 end up with like 6 hrs per day with 90% battery health. And a brand new SE battery barely making to 7 hrs before going to 0%.

iOS 12 might change that. But for now battery life on iOS 12 for me is much worse.
Click to expand...
I used to dislike my 5s's battery life because it gave me 6 hours on its original version. I would hate it if my 6s barely matched the 5s. I was so happy when I saw the actual improvements in battery life from the 5s to the 6s.
 
TantalizedMind said:
So the fact that I fully dispense my iPhone SE battery 2-3x a day means....
Click to expand...
Quite heavy... Or a lot heavier. On average, I'm on 0.43 cycles a day on my iPhone, and 0.37 a day on my iPad (and I use my iPad a LOT) but I use it indoors (lower brightness) and generally, not for heavy stuff.
 
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