Very interesting indeed. This lines up with my experience with my 14 Pro. I used to be able to use my phone and still have battery overnight and the next morning while camping and now I get ~5 hours.
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iOS 26 battery life thread.
- Thread starter goldmac2006
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This is super interesting. Why? Because this is a ridiculously heavy test. Heavy use, full brightness, cellular, in what is possibly the heaviest test conditions.
I have repeatedly mentioned throughout the years that these battery tests have a fatal flaw: heavy usage blurs iPhones together. The true efficiency of original iOS versions is seen with light to moderate use.
With a moderate usage pattern, I would at least double the delta, which would match some reports of a 20% loss, give or take a few percentage points, for light to moderate users on the 16 series.
My phone is an iPhone 16 Plus running iOS 18. I am a light, efficient user, with a light SOT battery life of about 27 hours, and a moderate cellular battery life of 20-22 hours. This would include at least a 5.5 hour and a 4-4.something hour loss respectively, which, due to it being the first major version, is massively significant: iPhones did not lose as much battery life on their first major version.
As you can all see, the iPhone 15 (which is the oldest iPhone tested) suffers the most, with a massive 13% loss with the heaviest usage pattern. It is not a travesty to assume that, with lighter use, we are talking about a loss in the realm of about 25% vs iOS 18, let alone 17.
This is absolutely ridiculous. The newest updatable version should NOT, under any circumstances, suffer this much on its first major update. I fear the impact of iOS 26 on the iPhone 11, 12, and 13 series vs iOS 13, 14, and 15 respectively would be eye-watering. This is unacceptable.
That said, it is also a little ridiculous that the 16 Plus on iOS 18 is the battery champ with such a difference, and it is also trailed by… the 16 Pro Max on iOS 18!!!! which would signal that there is a problem with battery consumption and use on all iPhones. The newest version is the most optimised for it and suffers the least, but it cannot be beaten by the previous original version combo like this. This isn’t normal.
The most inefficient way of testing with the smallest possible delta (heaviest use) shows THIS difference? This is pretty much irrefutable proof that there is something wrong with iOS 26, and perhaps for the first time ever, this includes the original devices for this iOS version. The iPhone X was fine on iOS 11, everything else was obliterated.
This is not the case here. Not even the 17 series with its efficiency can fight iOS 26’s pathetic inefficiency. The fact that Apple, for the first time ever (as far as I know) only now published a support article about updates and battery life shows that they know.
The 16 Plus and 16 Pro Max on iOS 18, with their smaller batteries, should NOT surpass the 17 series. That they do is a testament to iOS 26’s inefficiency, and this perhaps is glaring proof that Apple simply does not care about older devices.
I don’t know what’s happening on the iphone14pro as I used to have about 87% when I got to work when using the train and now it’s always 70% and the phone gets warm.
Not happy about it and that’s the latest .1 update.
Not happy about it and that’s the latest .1 update.
Thank you for this solid, cogent analysis of the situation.
I missed this. Do you have a link?
I can't believe everyone inside apple is happy about the situation. I believe they'll optimised it as Liquid Glass feels very rushed. The underlying code is likely jank.
About Apple software updates - Apple Support
Apple regularly provides software updates that improve your device with new features, important security enhancements, and bug fixes. Learn more about why they are important and how they work.
Ah I was aware of that piece, but didn't know it said this at the end:About Apple software updates - Apple Support
Apple regularly provides software updates that improve your device with new features, important security enhancements, and bug fixes. Learn more about why they are important and how they work.support.apple.com
Says everything, doesn't it...
A week after fresh install although it's not iOS 18 levels of good, it's definitely settled down. Hoping for further improvements in subsequent releases.
I’d remember something about throttling and iOS updates. That this was done by Apple on older iPhones running later iOS updates to make you upgrade your iPhone.
(E.g. an iPhone XR running iOS 18 doesn’t feel it’s best unlike when it runs iOS 12)
Apple started to throttle iPhones surreptitiously with the 6s on iOS 10.2.1. They did it without telling anyone, throttling the processor when the battery was degraded and couldn’t cope, due to a factory hardware issue on some models.
It obviously blew up, and starting from iOS 11.3, Apple added the battery health number and showed when devices were throttled. (Peak performance capability). Apple also added a support document for other iPhones. The iPhone 8 series was throttled on iOS 12.1; the iPhone Xʀ series was throttled on iOS 13.1 (mine on iOS 12 isn’t!), and from the 11 onwards it was always enabled.
You can disable it manually, however. The only devices that cannot be “un-throttled” are any 6s between iOS 10.2.1 and iOS 11.3. (My 6s also runs iOS 10.0, so, it has been spared!)
iPads and Macs have never been throttled.
That’s why I brought it up! I remember seeing it in the news when iOS 11 was out—they were doing that whole thing.
Peak performance capability was the part that figured out if your iPhone was throttling or doing brightness changes to keep the battery alive. And even slowing down so much, like when you’re typing on your iPhone.
Also, in the 26.0.1 build, I’ve been getting the refresh rate lowered when I scroll on my Home Screen. I tried closing a couple of apps that weren’t in use and restarting, but it only helped a little. Someone who uses adaptive power mode, is that usually a thing it does to help with battery life dynamically? I was thinking of turning off adaptive mode if it was the culprit.
My 14 PM battery has been fine with the update. No excessive heat or drain. Unfortunately, no improvement either. But I’ll take that instead of degradation any day.
Something’s wrong with my 16 Pro and I can’t work out what - it essentially seems to be always active and the ‘screen idle time’ is ridiculously high. I didn’t use to have any issues until 26 and can’t even remember what the screen time was but would finish the day at 30%+. Now I can not even go through half a day without having to almost fully charge the phone and then it’s nearly flat!
Checked that no app has background use and hard booted a few times but no luck. Have just installed iOS 26.1 Beta but no change to idle time! Anyone have any suggestions on what could be going on?
Checked that no app has background use and hard booted a few times but no luck. Have just installed iOS 26.1 Beta but no change to idle time! Anyone have any suggestions on what could be going on?
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I have the same problem, I noticed instagram was using a lot of background battery so I tried uninstalling it today, will report if it helps.
safari was also reporting a lot of battery usage on Sunday.
The usage percentage was orange too. I’m still on 26.0.1. Not touching the beta as I hate slide to stop alarm
I’m also having lots of Screen Idle time on an iPhone 17 Pro Max which I set up as brand new. The actual apps listed below don’t seem to add up enough to the total background usage for screen idle time, so I’m perplexed. As far as I can recall, my 16PM on iOS 26 didn’t have this issue, so not sure what’s going on
Albeit my battery health is 88% on my iPhone 13 Pro Max, but I can barely get six hours screen time even after starting again from scratch. I hope it improves soon.
Battery drain on 15pro is so bad with ios 26.1!
It won't get any better, welcome to the new reality of iOS 26.
The battery drain is real, not because of indexing, iOS 26 is overblown with new futures and background tasks this cost battery capacity.
I need to charge my iPhone SE 3, 2 times a day this is not funny anymore. Apple has so many new innovations but doesn't invest in new battery tech/chemistry.
The only solution buying a phone with 6000 mah or using iPhones with battery packs or power banks. very sad.
I need to charge my iPhone SE 3, 2 times a day this is not funny anymore. Apple has so many new innovations but doesn't invest in new battery tech/chemistry.
The only solution buying a phone with 6000 mah or using iPhones with battery packs or power banks. very sad.
Ignoring the purportedly expensive “liquid glass” animations, I’m not sure what new features/background tasks they added — otherwise someone would have figured out how to turn them off and bring us back to sanity. There just has to be some bug(s) that affect certain scenarios to keep the thing awake all the time. Leaving the phone sitting on a desk for hours without even touching it and the %’s melt away.