Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
I've stopped using the battery percentage since upgrading to my 6s+. as a former iOS technician, I've known that the percentage was merely a prediction, not precise.

I don't use it any more since iOS 9 on my iPhone 6 because even without Low Power Mode it still lasts long enough between charging possibilities. I noticed that it makes me a lot less anxious, especially if I have my external battery with me.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Jimmy Bubbles
I have my doubts, but IF this is time/zone change related then Apple have to rethink their regression testing with iOS. That has to be at least four instances where change of time has affected behavior negatively, most prominently with alarms.
 
Article →
Maybe it's a combination of time settings and specific batches of phones.


Yes they do and afaik they admit to it.
What you described however seems to be a battery calibration issue. At least the latter example.
The former is by design.
Ever noticed you see 100% a whole lot longer than 98% for example?
Psychological reasons. You don't want the customer to see the drain right after unplugging the device.
Apple's not the only one to do that.

And as for 1%, that's not actually 1% either, the battery is always left with a remaining charge of 2-5% iirc in most cases, because actually emptying the battery can harm it. Running below 20% and above 80% wears out a battery too, but it's really a complete discharge (not what the phone force shut downs you at, but say leaving the phone uncharged after that for a prolonged time) that can ruin the battery.

Glassed Silver:mac
Yeah that's funny you say that because there have been times I unplug at 98% and then say eh I'll wait a few minutes then plug it back in and it's instantly 100%
 
  • Like
Reactions: Glassed Silver
Yep, I'm having this issue for the last couple of weeks... All due to playing Fallout Shelter and changing/cheating with time, I didn't know that this is connected with each other
 
That proves my point exactly. Battery life improvements can be made through software efficiency and not just by slapping a big ass battery on it.
As a software developer I can assure you that these are just a little tweaks that don't help much in real life. This is what Apple wants you to believe in. The truth is that if you want more battery life you need a bigger battery. The fact that Apple recently released a battery case for the first time in its history proves my point.
 
How weird. I wonder why the battery percentage would be tied to the time... Could it be that the battery percentage is recorded and gets stuck if the time gets set back?

It might be like this:

* The self-test the iPhone performs to gauge battery life might be expensive in some respect -- e.g., it might drain the battery a little.
* As an optimization, the measured life is cached after being read, along with the time the actual test was performed.
* When the battery display is to be updated it checks the current time vs. the time the battery was last actually tested. If not enough time has passed, the cached life is returned rather than performing the expensive test.

This could break down by changing the time back after a test. E,g.:

1. Battery is actually tested at 6:00am 1/1/2016. The result is 80%. The result and current time is recorded.
2. User sets time back to 1/1/2015 for whatever reason.
3. iOS decides to update the display and reads the battery life
4. The time since last actual measurement is negative one year: the cached value of 80% is retuned.
... battery runs down
... steps 3 and 4 repeat periodically, but since the clock is set back so far, the cached result continues to be used rather than performing an extra check.

The solution is to not use clock time to cache the value, but rather an internal "tick" that keeps counting up regardless of the clock.

I don't have sympathy for people changing the clock to avoid trial restrictions, but this may affect travelers or anyone during DST changes. (They might be using GMT clock time, in which case changing time zone would not cause a problem.)
[doublepost=1453059717][/doublepost]
As a software developer I can assure you that these are just a little tweaks that don't help much in real life. This is what Apple wants you to believe in. The truth is that if you want more battery life you need a bigger battery. The fact that Apple recently released a battery case for the first time in its history proves my point.

As a software developer, I can assure everyone that you are full of it.

Software -- whether app, OS, or driver -- determines how efficiently every resource on the device is used and that directly impacts battery life. And so does the capacity of the battery, of course.
[doublepost=1453059872][/doublepost]
Its a software issue. The same issue will occur on the replacement
OP didn't change the time, so it's not the same issue and therefore may not be a software issue.
 
Had this issue with my 6S. Got stuck on 83% all day once and it often dies when on 10%, only to woken again about 30 minutes later.
 
I have a 6+ (not S) and at times my battery goes from ~27% to ~3% at times at random within a second. When i plug it into a power source, it immediately shoots back up to where it was.

A restart (hard or soft) does not remedy this
 
  • Like
Reactions: bstpierre
I used to think there was a battery level indicator problem on my 6s+, until i found out that the battery actually lasts me as much as a week
 
Hey! My iPhone 6 (128gb, not the S model) went a bit loopy today, for the first time.

I left the house with it at 50% to go on a walk with my partner. I took a few photos and put it back in my pocket. When I get home and take the phone out it's totally switched off. When it boots up it's at 35% battery. But sometime later it switched off again, this time booting back up to 29%. I go into the settings app and it jumps right to 1%.

After only 15 minutes on the charger it's back to 60%.

I think I'll report this oddness to Apple.
 
I have an iPhone 6S Plus as yet haven't seen this issue.

When I have tried low battery mode the phone get rather hot as yet hasn't shut itself down due to heat issues. I have put a bug report in about the issue.
 
I think it has to do with some algorithm Apple has, to calculate what displays as battery percentage. It's usage (processors, etc) over time (hours and minutes). Just a hunch
 
i wonder if Apple is playing with the percentage like they did with the signal bars...

EDIT: I still have the iPhone 5. And I literally can be on 1% for 45 minutes, or be on 39% and then restart the phone only to find out I'm at 8%.


I had this issue and live close to an apple store so wandered in - It was a new iPhone 5 , replaced by Apple a month before, and they replaced it again . Customer service these days is way better than quality control
 
As a software developer, I can assure everyone that you are full of it.

Software -- whether app, OS, or driver -- determines how efficiently every resource on the device is used and that directly impacts battery life.
You missed my point. I know that software impacts battery life. But iOS is a world class operating system, you can't do much here software-wise. And Apple is trying to say that it is OK to shrink iPhone battery because they can optimise the OS and everything will be just fine, which is not true.
So make sure you understand what you read before you start "assuring everyone" again.
 
Apple released that for these who wouldn't mind having an ugly brick in their pockets for the sake of few more hours of battery life.
Ugly brick, in your pocket.
This part of your post shows how much sense you are not making.

Apple release something ugly. Something they are not famous for.
Something ugly you keep in your pocket. Where you can’t see it.

Don’t be so ridiculous. It’s because the damned battery doesn’t last long enough.
 
  • Like
Reactions: fzfpff
Apple released that for these who wouldn't mind having an ugly brick in their pockets for the sake of few more hours of battery life.

They didn't think there is a need for that until they shrinked the battery in iPhone 6s. Brilliant. :rolleyes:
 

I have noticed this exact same thing on my iPhone6. I suspect it's not limited to the 6S's at all but to all phones in certain conditional states.
 
Same here with iPhone 5! Did a battery calibration, helped for some days then ended up with the iPhone shutting down at around 26% displayed battery life again.

It's the same for me and it's driving me crazy. My iPhone 5 also does not update battery percentage as mention in the post above. And it's definitely not an issue caused by changing time manually, because I've never done that.
 
  • Like
Reactions: KJL3000
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.