indefinite
macrumors regular
My M2 iPad Pro 12.9 drops by 15% overnight and lasts for 3 hours on a full charge with 500+ cycles.
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iPad Pro Battery drains very quickly.
- Thread starter jcmendes
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MacCheetah3
macrumors 68030
If the battery in your iPhone or iPad drains too quickly - Apple Support
Try these tips to get the most life out of your iPhone or iPad each time you charge it.
My m1 iPad Pro after years of usage on degraded battery health doesn’t come close to this and lasts multiple days. What were you doing with iPad that was draining 60% a day in standby?
Logic dictates that between two identical devices (hardware), the device that is exhibiting higher standby drain is simply doing more work in the background that is keeping it from staying in the lowest power state for a longer period of time. The challenge for users who have poor battery life is to determine the software and settings that are contributing to it and evaluating whether the benefits of those are worth the extra drain, so it's great when feedback on potential places to look is given. Posts about having great standby drain are certainly valid in that they prove that better performance is achievable but at the end of the day the variation is still going to exist between different users.
Yeah but draining 60% on standby in a day isn’t logical unless it’s faulty battery. I could leave iPad with cellular in a dead zone trying to connect to network all day won’t degrade the battery to that extent. In fact iPad Pro is excellent hot spot and battery last lot longer than tethering from iPhone.
I'm serious my iPad M1 would drop 20% overnight, 30% over 12 hours. It's one reason why I got rid of it. Not only that but it would take 10 hours to charge 10%. Not kidding. And it wasn't the charger I've tried multiple chargers. 20 watts, 45 watts, 60 watts 100 Watts I have them all.
Clearly had a bad battery.
ScanTheNavian
macrumors 6502
Do you have an Apple Pencil attached to it? That little bugger drains my iPP M1 so much that I prefer to keep it deatched. I just hang it on different furniture pieces that are metallic lol.
It's overall unfortunate how much energy it requires. If I write something for a while it feels like my iPad will be down 20% by the time I'm done. Not to mention how it makes the iPad heat up sometimes.
It's overall unfortunate how much energy it requires. If I write something for a while it feels like my iPad will be down 20% by the time I'm done. Not to mention how it makes the iPad heat up sometimes.
JulianStaples
macrumors member
I've also been trying to diagnose a battery drain on my 2020 11" Pro recently, and I'm starting to suspect the Pencil as well. I mainly use my iPad when travelling, so it can go days sitting on standby. That's never been an issue before, but 2 weeks ago I charged it to 100% after using it over the weekend, and 2-3 days later it was completely dead. 🙀
Checking battery usage, each day was showing a 20-30% background energy drain from some random app (Mail, Weather, Health, different each day). But once I charged it and detached it from both the Magic Keyboard and the Pencil, standby drain was negligible, as I'd expect (maybe 4-5% each day across several apps). Now I'm experimenting with keyboard attached/Pencil detached, keyboard detached/Pencil attached, both attached, and so on. And the Pencil seems to be the guilty party. Not sure why the battery monitor assigns the energy drain to random apps, mind you. 🤔
All very odd. I've had this Pencil attached to the iPad for years without this being an issue before. Seen some suggestions online that unpairing/re-pairing the Pencil can help, so I guess that's the next step.
Checking battery usage, each day was showing a 20-30% background energy drain from some random app (Mail, Weather, Health, different each day). But once I charged it and detached it from both the Magic Keyboard and the Pencil, standby drain was negligible, as I'd expect (maybe 4-5% each day across several apps). Now I'm experimenting with keyboard attached/Pencil detached, keyboard detached/Pencil attached, both attached, and so on. And the Pencil seems to be the guilty party. Not sure why the battery monitor assigns the energy drain to random apps, mind you. 🤔
All very odd. I've had this Pencil attached to the iPad for years without this being an issue before. Seen some suggestions online that unpairing/re-pairing the Pencil can help, so I guess that's the next step.
JulianStaples
macrumors member
Pencil definitely seems to be the cause of my issue. Not needed to use the iPad this week, so I've charged it to 100% every night, then left it closed in the Magic Keyboard on sleep/standby for a day at a time. One day with the Pencil attached, one with the Pencil detached, then Pencil attached, and so on.
Get a battery drain of 5-6% over 24 hours with no Pencil attached, which I'd expect for a 5 year old model with 90% BH. With the Pencil attached, that number grows to anywhere between 22-40%. 😯 Although weirdly, the battery usage is always attributed to random apps still (Mail, Weather and Health being the major ones).
Don't remember it being this bad before. Not sure if the Pencil's battery is faltering so it's sucking extra juice from the iPad all of a sudden. Will send my tests over to Apple Support, but all their diagnostics have reported no issues, so I doubt they'll do anything other than call it expected behaviour.
Probably just gonna ditch the Pencil at this point. Used to use it a lot for note taking, but it gets used a lot less now, and I guess I can live without it as an accessory. 🥲
Get a battery drain of 5-6% over 24 hours with no Pencil attached, which I'd expect for a 5 year old model with 90% BH. With the Pencil attached, that number grows to anywhere between 22-40%. 😯 Although weirdly, the battery usage is always attributed to random apps still (Mail, Weather and Health being the major ones).
Don't remember it being this bad before. Not sure if the Pencil's battery is faltering so it's sucking extra juice from the iPad all of a sudden. Will send my tests over to Apple Support, but all their diagnostics have reported no issues, so I doubt they'll do anything other than call it expected behaviour.
Probably just gonna ditch the Pencil at this point. Used to use it a lot for note taking, but it gets used a lot less now, and I guess I can live without it as an accessory. 🥲
FeliApple
macrumors 601
I know that the original post mentions an M5, but I’m a little surprised by the M1 users saying that standby battery life is excellent on the M1 iPads.
Standby battery life on my iPads has been excellent. The iPad 4’s standby battery life was insane, the 9.7-inch iPad Pro’s standby battery life was also amazing. All of this on original iOS versions. When Apple forced the 9.7-inch iPad Pro from iOS 9 to iOS 12, screen-on battery life plummeted, by about 30%, but standby was (and still is) like-new.
While I still have the Pro, I upgraded to the iPad Air 5 (M1). I’m typing this with it, and it has always been (and still is) on its original version, iPadOS 15.6. For the first time ever, standby battery life is significantly worse. Nothing unusable like the 30-60% per day mentioned above, but poor. I’d estimate at least 10% every 24 hours. That is awful, I’m used to iPads pretty much dropping 0%. Overnight, maybe it would drop 4-5%. That’s awful. iPads for me have always dropped 0%. Maybe 1%, but not 5%.
I bought this iPad in 2022 after six years of my 9.7-inch. I assumed this was just iOS inefficiency. Okay, Apple broke standby time, it sucks but we have to get used to it. Last year, I bought the 11th-gen iPad (A16). And we are back to normal. It’s running and will run iPadOS 18, standby battery life is amazing. Same thing happened with iPhones: when I got the Air 5, I had my iPhone Xʀ on iOS 12. Awful standby time, reinforcing my theory that “Apple broke something”. Upgraded to the 16 Plus on iOS 18, amazing again.
I only have one Apple Pencil, the Apple Pencil 2, only compatible with the Air 5. I have never left it attached, but if left with Bluetooth on, yeah, I’d reckon it’d further kill standby battery life. The iPad’s SOT runtime drops significantly even while using light note-taking apps with low brightness. (Drops by 20%).
In conclusion, the only iPad I’ve had with poor standby battery life is my Air 5 (M1), even though it’s running iPadOS 15.
Standby battery life on my iPads has been excellent. The iPad 4’s standby battery life was insane, the 9.7-inch iPad Pro’s standby battery life was also amazing. All of this on original iOS versions. When Apple forced the 9.7-inch iPad Pro from iOS 9 to iOS 12, screen-on battery life plummeted, by about 30%, but standby was (and still is) like-new.
While I still have the Pro, I upgraded to the iPad Air 5 (M1). I’m typing this with it, and it has always been (and still is) on its original version, iPadOS 15.6. For the first time ever, standby battery life is significantly worse. Nothing unusable like the 30-60% per day mentioned above, but poor. I’d estimate at least 10% every 24 hours. That is awful, I’m used to iPads pretty much dropping 0%. Overnight, maybe it would drop 4-5%. That’s awful. iPads for me have always dropped 0%. Maybe 1%, but not 5%.
I bought this iPad in 2022 after six years of my 9.7-inch. I assumed this was just iOS inefficiency. Okay, Apple broke standby time, it sucks but we have to get used to it. Last year, I bought the 11th-gen iPad (A16). And we are back to normal. It’s running and will run iPadOS 18, standby battery life is amazing. Same thing happened with iPhones: when I got the Air 5, I had my iPhone Xʀ on iOS 12. Awful standby time, reinforcing my theory that “Apple broke something”. Upgraded to the 16 Plus on iOS 18, amazing again.
I only have one Apple Pencil, the Apple Pencil 2, only compatible with the Air 5. I have never left it attached, but if left with Bluetooth on, yeah, I’d reckon it’d further kill standby battery life. The iPad’s SOT runtime drops significantly even while using light note-taking apps with low brightness. (Drops by 20%).
In conclusion, the only iPad I’ve had with poor standby battery life is my Air 5 (M1), even though it’s running iPadOS 15.
FeliApple
macrumors 601
It is indeed probably expected behaviour. The Pencil attached and standby battery life are not compatible. Remove the Pencil from the iPad and turn off Bluetooth, 40% per day is ridiculous, you’re practically cycling the iPad through standby drain.
It is not necessary to ditch the Pencil. Its standby battery life is insanely good. Charge it to 100% and remove it, it’ll be fine. (And obviously disable Bluetooth on the iPad so it’s not connected). I just keep it in its box, it’s fine.
FeliApple
macrumors 601
Do you use the Pencil with high brightness? Don’t leave it attached as you know because standby battery life with the Pencil is garbage, but I only see a 20% difference with low brightness while taking notes vs regular light usage. I reckon that high brightness + the Pencil isn’t a good combo for battery life.
JulianStaples
macrumors member
Ok. I do wonder if the Pencil battery is the issue then. I've never had battery drain like this before, used to be able to leave it for a week or more with the pencil attached and still have a decent chunk of battery left. Now 2-3 days and the iPad is dead. I guess it was my mistake leaving the Pencil docked long-term after my usage of it dropped. It's been clamped there constantly charging itself for weeks at a time. 😭
Will do some tests leaving the pencil undocked with bluetooth off and see if the battery lasts. If not, might have to either get rid of it after all, or otherwise look at a battery replacement (I assume it's a unit replacement for the AP, assume they're not actually repairable).
FeliApple
macrumors 601
Try it, but I have a strong confidence in that solution. It will probably fix it. Disable Bluetooth, keep the Pencil in its box (or wherever you like except attached to the iPad), and I reckon you’ll be fine.
Adolmino100
macrumors member
I have an M1 ipad pro 11 inch, and i'm still on ios 18.7, should i stay or update to ios 26.2.1? im not interested in the new ios features, im only interested in battery life, so if i upgrade to ios 26 i'm worried about battery life being worse? thankyou
FeliApple
macrumors 601
Stay on iPadOS 18. People overwhelmingly report a significant drop in battery life coming from iPadOS 18, and if you only care about battery life, then you replied to yourself.
Adolmino100
macrumors member
JulianStaples
macrumors member
Hey, just a quick thank you. ☺️ Looks like this has solved the drain issue. Had the Pencil detached and Bluetooth off since late Sunday night, and the iPad has only dropped to 80% charge since then (still some background Weather/Home Accessories processes to blame for that, but I can investigate that separately). Just re-connected the Pencil to check it wasn't draining, and that is still at 100%.
Still not quite sure why the Pencil started draining the battery so aggressively while attached just recently, but this is a happy solution to give me confidence that I can leave my iPad on standby until I need it. 😀
ExploRichie
macrumors 6502
My iPad Pro 11 M5 has a standby consumption about 4-5% a day without using it. Overnight there there is a drain about 1-2% in 8 hours.
This is with WiFi 5G / Bluetooth enabled and Low Power Mode disabled.
When using it with drawing in Noteful and browsing it consumes about 10% in 1 hour. I think this is normal?!
This is with WiFi 5G / Bluetooth enabled and Low Power Mode disabled.
When using it with drawing in Noteful and browsing it consumes about 10% in 1 hour. I think this is normal?!
Abazigal
Contributor
My experience with the M4 iPad Pro is that yup, the battery does drain that fast.
I have 80% charge limit turned on. During the day, I teach with my iPad in the classroom and typically end with it at around 30-50%, depending on how it's used. Sometimes, the iPad gets projected less because I am giving written work. Sometimes, it doubles as a visualiser with the camera app. A fair amount of the time, I am either presenting slides from powerpoint or annotating on documents in Notability. Back at my desk, I can be streaming YouTube or a podcast while marking my students' work.
I take this opportunity to charge my laptop back to 80% before leaving school for the day, though back at home, between slay the spire, social media (reddit / ivory / web browsing / twitch), it can be at 30% or less when it's time for bed.
I sometimes wonder if the 80% battery level that the iPad is not the real 80%. Like once in a while, my iPad charges to 100%, and I notice that it takes significantly longer for my iPad to drain below 80%, and then it drops faster once battery life goes below 80%. But based on my observation, even at 100%, my iPad Pro would still struggle to make it through the day, so I am leaving it at 80% for now in the hope that there will indeed be some long-term benefit to the battery health (currently at 88% already).
On a whim, I also decided to restore my iPad yesterday and set it up as new. Battery life predictably dropped like a rock as it was busy installing apps and downloading files, but right away, I noticed an immediate "snappiness" in long-pressing on links that wasn't there before. Let's see how it fares over the rest of the week. 😬
I have 80% charge limit turned on. During the day, I teach with my iPad in the classroom and typically end with it at around 30-50%, depending on how it's used. Sometimes, the iPad gets projected less because I am giving written work. Sometimes, it doubles as a visualiser with the camera app. A fair amount of the time, I am either presenting slides from powerpoint or annotating on documents in Notability. Back at my desk, I can be streaming YouTube or a podcast while marking my students' work.
I take this opportunity to charge my laptop back to 80% before leaving school for the day, though back at home, between slay the spire, social media (reddit / ivory / web browsing / twitch), it can be at 30% or less when it's time for bed.
I sometimes wonder if the 80% battery level that the iPad is not the real 80%. Like once in a while, my iPad charges to 100%, and I notice that it takes significantly longer for my iPad to drain below 80%, and then it drops faster once battery life goes below 80%. But based on my observation, even at 100%, my iPad Pro would still struggle to make it through the day, so I am leaving it at 80% for now in the hope that there will indeed be some long-term benefit to the battery health (currently at 88% already).
On a whim, I also decided to restore my iPad yesterday and set it up as new. Battery life predictably dropped like a rock as it was busy installing apps and downloading files, but right away, I noticed an immediate "snappiness" in long-pressing on links that wasn't there before. Let's see how it fares over the rest of the week. 😬
Nuubi
macrumors newbie
Normal. iPP 11 M5 wifi myself can go 3-4 days of light usage between charges.
Once it stops charging @ 80% unplug and reboot. After reboot batt% will show 84-5% and drains “normally”. It’s just how iOS iPadOS macOS estimates displays charge level from my experience. 100% not true 100% more like pseudo “105%”.