Extend M4 iPad Pro Battery Lifespan With This New Feature

[Ghost31]

Maybe I’m crazy but i just have never given a damn about battery health. Like at all. I charge my phone when i want. I let it discharge to whatever the hell it is. Usually i upgrade every couple years anyway so it never matters to me. Although my battery health is usually really good when i sell it. That always surprises me Because i do absolutely nothing to help

 

[Newgoblin49]

The way I see it, it is better to turn the feature on, and if you absolutely need hundred percent battery for a particular day, then you can turn it off. for most days You will not need that hundred percent , in that way overtime you can prolong your battery.

it’s pretty black and white

 

[Solver]

With many other iPads you can use a shortcut automation to give you a notification when the devices are over 80 charged.

 

[Woochoo]

Why not make batteries that have an extra 20% we never "see". So 100% is basically 80%.

You actually have 100%, but if you don’t need it (i.e working on home or close to a plug) just charge it from 20 to 80% so the battery lifespan is bigger. Then, when you really need to have the 100% (i.e traveling) you will have more battery lifespan.

This won’t change until we move from Lithium to solid state (like sodium sulphur) batteries, that don’t degrade when discharging or charging to max. And they are safer than Lithium as they don’t burn/explode. The downside is they don’t have the Li capacity yet so they aren’t still massively adopted

 

[jmgregory1]

the battery neuroticism needs to end

maybe design devices so the one disposable part can be replaced more easily?

You mean like all electronics used to have, where you had pop-off battery covers (that often broke), with replaceable batteries that were inherently undersized (due to the tradeoff of requiring the battery cover, connector pins, etc.).

I would bet that replacing iPad batteries happens in such small numbers as to be effectively a non-issue, other than on tech sites where people complain about all sorts of non-issues. So let’s go back to devices that are a couple of inches thick, have batteries that offer a couple of hours of run time and a battery cover that comes off and gets lost. That would be awesome!

 

[CoMoMacUser]

The “lifers” that hold onto their iPad for many, many years would certainly benefit from this.

I still have an iPad 1. Okay for very limited stuff, but that battery still lasts like when it was brand new. That longevity was one of the reasons why I switched from Androids to the iPhone years ago, and I haven't been disappointed. I recently replaced my 11 Pro Max, which was still 91%.

 

[kalafalas]

Only 80% limit? Why no optimized setting?

 

[Wags]

Not sure what worse. Charging to 100 and using to below 10 or charging way more often. From how I see family members use. More charging more harmful.

 

[magbarn]

They are, however you cannot ever get one on the iPad. Apple stores simply do not replace batteries on the iPad like they do on the iPhone. They only ever replace the entire device and only if the health indicator drops below 80% which it only does after many years when the battery life has long since decreased noticeably. Many iPads cannot ever get any replacement as the battery remains above Apple's threshold until the device is declared vintage and replacements are no longer being stocked.

Good pricing is irrelevant when you can't get the service in the first place. My iPad's down to about 3 hours of battery life now but Apple tells me they can't swap the battery on my M1 iPad and the device is not eligible to replaced even though it's about 3 years old now. Maybe I can replace it in 1-2 years but that means suffering with the bad battery for that long and next year I am interested in upgrading to the M4 anyways.

So for all intents and purposes it's impossible to get a battery replacement.


Sure but giving us extra features that are optional and disabled by default to cater to a small minority of customers that really want it is a good thing and Apple doesn't do it often enough. There are many times I wish I could change some behaviour even though my opinion wouldn't be a very popular one. The more such options we get the more versatile Apple products can become. And I do think the 80% option is a good one for people that don't use their devices too much and don't ever need the full battery charge.

This is it here folks. Many here don't keep their iPads long enough to hit this wall. My iPad Air2's battery life has been bad for several years with coconut battery reporting only 70% health after 800+ cycles. It only lasts about a hour before shutting off. I've taken it multiple times to the Apple Store and their stupid "diagnostic" app uses some other algorithm than coconut battery and continues to claim that the battery still has over 80% battery life left. It's now vintage, so the only way I can get a battery replacement now is to use crappy 3rd party batteries. We have multiple other reports here and on reddit on Apple refusing to replace iPad batteries no matter how much you argue with them.

I've had batteries go bad on iPhones and MacBooks and Apple's diagnostic app battery health reading is about the same in coconut battery. iPads are a completely different story.

This feature would be awesome to have on my M1 iPP, but we know Apple won't ever give it to us.

 

[mrat93]

Absolutely. My 15pro has just gone to 99% after 8 months..usually it would be like 95%

There was a thread a month-or-so ago where i reported my 15 pro with nearly 300 cycles had 100% capacity.

Days later, I saw it was at 99%. Today, it’s at 95% with 340 cycles.

I’ve had the 80% limit set for all-but a week total since I got it on launch day. I was on a trip recently where I turned it off. I wonder if charging to 100% recalibrated it or something. It’s also been charging to 100 in recent days for some reason — I think it does it automatically every so often, but it seems more frequent lately.

Still, 95% for 340 cycles isn’t so bad imo.

 

[toobravetosave]

You mean like all electronics used to have, where you had pop-off battery covers (that often broke), with replaceable batteries that were inherently undersized (due to the tradeoff of requiring the battery cover, connector pins, etc.).

I would bet that replacing iPad batteries happens in such small numbers as to be effectively a non-issue, other than on tech sites where people complain about all sorts of non-issues. So let’s go back to devices that are a couple of inches thick, have batteries that offer a couple of hours of run time and a battery cover that comes off and gets lost. That would be awesome!

yeah i’m sure like everything else replaceable battery technology would also remain stagnant for decades

selling disposable products is simply more profitable otherwise we would have replaceable batteries in just as thin devices

keep up the yearly cycle i’m sure it will last forever

 

[usmaak]

I think that it's nice that they give us options. It's not a requirement. Use it or don't. 🤷‍♂️

 

[G5isAlive]

Not sure what worse. Charging to 100 and using to below 10 or charging way more often. From how I see family members use. More charging more harmful.

Nope. What you are likely seeing is the family members charging more are likely using more, and that can decrease battery life faster. Holding all other variables constant, let's say you need over the course of one month a total of 450 watt hours of power (using round numbers), and that the charge your phone can hold is 15 watt hours. Phone a) you charge every time from 0 to 100, that is 30 cycles. Phone B) you charge every time from 30 to 80% that is 60 cycles. Yes you charged phone b more often, but at the end of the month phone b's batter will have better health. thats just how the batteries work and has been well tested.

Of course there will be anecdotal evidence to suggest otherwise, we see plenty of that in this forum, but eh, I go with the odds, and trust the science.

 

[G5isAlive]

Not only that, but you also shouldn't go below 20% (that's what they recommend) so effectively you have 3/5 of the advertised battery life.

Nope. I have 100% of the battery life when I need it. But in my typical day I rarely need more than 40% of the total. I get other people need more, and that's cool. You do you. But for those that just use 40% this is a good thing. And on the occasions I want 100% available (going on a trip for example), I turn off the feature and change to 100% and use to whatever I need. Full 100% available.

In the end it's just a choice. I get why some don't bother with it. I am not the battery life police or a shamer, but it's just a choice. Turn it on. Turn it off. Have it your way. I like informed choices.

 

[jon9091]

I want one that goes to 11.

 

[sdf]

It’s amazing to me that people limit their devices to 80% capacity in get a longer lifespan for their batteries. When my devices dip to 80%, I look to change the batteries. And I’m pretty sure that used to be apples recommendation. People limiting to 80% have the experience I can’t stand from day one. I’m glad it works for them.

 

[kfury77]

I still have an iPad 1. Okay for very limited stuff, but that battery still lasts like when it was brand new.

Interesting. I'm really curious what you can still use an iPad 1 for since I'd imagine most third-party apps no longer work, nothing to download on the App Store and Safari is so old that many websites no longer work on it.

 

[skeptech]

The important question we need the answer to is: if we turn on this feature, this battery charging strategy, how much longer will the battery last as part of the lifetime of the given iPad?

Without that information, we can't determine how useful this feature really is, what its value is, and therefore decide individually for ourselves whether to turn it on or not, and when.

 

[CoolSpot]

This is the sort of nonsense that wouldn’t fly with Steve Jobs still around. If you have an optimal charge capacity for your batteries, just make that the default and label that 100% charged.

Zero users are going to care if there is some extra charging capacity that’s invisible to them. A lot of users are going to be pissed if you only let them charge their phone to 80%.

 

[vtrautia]

Great. Finally we have this Pro feature. We need this feature to all battery powered Apple products.

 

[rchornef]

We need this for the Mac: Automatic, off and 80% charge limit. The current automatic setting works surprisingly badly compared to iOS.

Amen to that. Needs some human intervention. Currently seems like the stupidest piece of Apple programming outside of the Siri/HomePod world. . .

 

[Riffz60]

It seems incredibly stupid to intentionally lower you battery capacity by 20% in order to preserve the battery that usually won’t go down more than 10-15% over 2-3 years

 

[rchornef]

Exactly.

Typical Apple over-engineering another aspect of iPhone and making it a premium only available for the latest products.

Apple owners would not care so much about battery life if repairs and battery replacements were fairly priced or easily diy'ed.

But of course, profits are higher on selling us new devices rather than helping us extend battery life on the ones we have.

They really want us to buy a whole new device with brand new battery to get this very rudimentary feature.

You don’t even get this on iPhones 14 Pro despite them having the same chip as the $799 iPhone 15.

Nor does iPad Pro M2 get it even though iPad Air M2 got it.

Good thing they ditched that Mother Nature ad campaign after one ad. This ain’t helping anyone but the shareholders.

I have an iPhone 14 Pro and the feature is there in the settings under "Optimized Battery Charging" which has the iPhone "learn" about "your daily charging routine so it can wait to finish charging past 80% until you need it."

The only caveat is that IT DOES NOT WORK! This feature does not and has never done anything on my iPhone even though I am an obvious candidate to limit to 80%. . .

Called Apple "technical support" about this a few times, they hardly understand the feature of concepts behind lithium battery usage optimization. Gives the impression that Apple could care less about battery health. . .

 

[dominiongamma]

Absolutely. My 15pro has just gone to 99% after 8 months..usually it would be like 95%

Mine is at 100 still going strong

 

[dominiongamma]

The 80% feature has been great for my iPhone battery so far !