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iPad Pro iPad Pro always running out of juice

Manatee

Manatee

Contributor
Original poster
Oct 20, 2003
596
169
Washington DC
I'm having a hard time keeping my iPad Pro sufficiently charged. I use it all day at work, and at home in the evening. I plug it in at my desk at the office, and when I'm sitting on the couch at home - like now, but it charges so slowly that it frequently slips below 20% when I'm in meetings, and even below 10%.

I never had this problem with the smaller iPads. I assume the Pro's battery capacity in comparable to the Air 2 - in proportion to what the device draws. The problem is that there are still the same number of hours in a day, and the same amount of time between meetings during the day. I'm surprised that Apple didn't notice in testing that it takes a long time to charge the Pro. What the Pro really needs is a faster way to charge - more capacity per hour.

I assume there's no possible fix for this with the Pro. I hope they'll consider it for the Pro 2. For now, I'll probably just carry my Mophie XL and a cable to meetings.
 
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Yep, it's a laptop sized battery with a tablet sized charger. Its inevitable. Microsoft did the same thing with the Surface 3.

Still, with the battery life of the IPP can't you make it all day on an overnight charge as mentioned above?
 
How do you have your display brightness set? If you have Auto Brightness off and you turn the brightness up, it will affect your battery life. Sounds obvious but it may be something you didn't think about.
 
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Brightness has a much bigger impact on the Pro than other iPads it seems. At full brightness I don't think you can expect more than 6 hours of battery life. Even just reducing it to 75% or so will get you 9-10 hours. Kind of sucks because the bigger screen feels dimmer than other iPads at the lower brightness, especially in bright office environments and such.
 
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Thanks for the replies.

I do charge it overnight. Once I start using it, it seems to run down faster than the Air. When I charge it while using it - always using the standard Apple charger, it seems like the charger just keeps up... The percent charged goes up very slowly. I'm surprised that it doesn't have a bigger charger than the Air. I do keep the screen fairly bright - about 75%. But that's the same as I set my Air.

I'll get used to what it takes to maintain a sufficient charge, but it's notably harder than with the Air. I find myself heading off to afternoon meetings with 16% battery or so, which didn't happen with the Air. When I plugged in the Air while at my desk, the battery charged quickly. The Pro just goes up a few percent when I use it plugged in.

Just seems like Apple didn't maintain the level of user experience with the charging rate of the Pro. I wish they had a faster charger, even if it were physically larger.
 
Manatee said:
Thanks for the replies.

I do charge it overnight. Once I start using it, it seems to run down faster than the Air. When I charge it while using it - always using the standard Apple charger, it seems like the charger just keeps up... The percent charged goes up very slowly. I'm surprised that it doesn't have a bigger charger than the Air. I do keep the screen fairly bright - about 75%. But that's the same as I set my Air.

I'll get used to what it takes to maintain a sufficient charge, but it's notably harder than with the Air. I find myself heading off to afternoon meetings with 16% battery or so, which didn't happen with the Air. When I plugged in the Air while at my desk, the battery charged quickly. The Pro just goes up a few percent when I use it plugged in.

Just seems like Apple didn't maintain the level of user experience with the charging rate of the Pro. I wish they had a faster charger, even if it were physically larger.
Click to expand...

Gotta have a reason for people to buy the iPad Pro 2...

Touch ID 2/3, sufficient charger, 64 gigs base storage, better battery..

iPad Pro 1 is the iPad 3 all over again..
 
Manatee said:
Thanks for the replies.

I do charge it overnight. Once I start using it, it seems to run down faster than the Air. When I charge it while using it - always using the standard Apple charger, it seems like the charger just keeps up... The percent charged goes up very slowly. I'm surprised that it doesn't have a bigger charger than the Air. I do keep the screen fairly bright - about 75%. But that's the same as I set my Air.

I'll get used to what it takes to maintain a sufficient charge, but it's notably harder than with the Air. I find myself heading off to afternoon meetings with 16% battery or so, which didn't happen with the Air. When I plugged in the Air while at my desk, the battery charged quickly. The Pro just goes up a few percent when I use it plugged in.

Just seems like Apple didn't maintain the level of user experience with the charging rate of the Pro. I wish they had a faster charger, even if it were physically larger.
Click to expand...
I really can't understand your ranting... You can charge it overnight... You can even charge it during usage... What's the point of your complaining? Is it recharging slowly during usage ?

Are you sure you don't have a defective unit ? 16% of battery left in the afternoon seems to be less than expected. Much less.
 
Manatee said:
Just seems like Apple didn't maintain the level of user experience with the charging rate of the Pro. I wish they had a faster charger, even if it were physically larger.
Click to expand...

The lightening connection is spec'ed at 5V, and the max current allowed for any 5V devices is 2.4A. Together, they give 12W. For Apple to give you the "fast" charger that you want, they will have to go above 12W. This means good-bye to lightening connector.

I don't know about you, but I would much rather stay with the lightening interface, than getting a faster charger. It will also mean you won't be able to charger your iPP with a battery pack.

By the way, no matter how much I use my iPP, I am yet to run out of battery juice within one day. You may want to investigate what app(s) are causing the excessive drain, or have Apple Store to take a look at your iPad.
 
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I doubt Lightning has any hard limit to how much current it can carry. That's one of the advantages of going with a proprietary connector. It is odd that they didn't beef it up a bit for the iPP though. The rMB has about the same size battery but charges most of it in just an hour.
 
zhenya said:
I doubt Lightning has any hard limit to how much current it can carry. That's one of the advantages of going with a proprietary connector. It is odd that they didn't beef it up a bit for the iPP though. The rMB has about the same size battery but charges most of it in just an hour.
Click to expand...

Operating on the new USB Power Delivery v2.0 standard, USB-C set-ups are able to draw up to 5 amps at 20 volts (100 watts). This is how the 12" MB is charged quickly.

Lightning and all "old" USB Power Delivery standard is fixed at 5V. You can't just "beef up" the voltage.
 
I know why the MacBook charges fast. I'd like to see some source indicating that lightning is limited to 12w. There is nothing preventing it from adhering to usb standards when plugged into a computer or generic usb charger, but drawing more power when plugged into Apple's own charging brick if they so wished. It's the same way that other implementations of fast charging over usb work.
 
zhenya said:
I know why the MacBook charges fast. I'd like to see some source indicating that lightning is limited to 12w. There is nothing preventing it from adhering to usb standards when plugged into a computer or generic usb charger, but drawing more power when plugged into Apple's own charging brick if they so wished. It's the same way that other implementations of fast charging over usb work.
Click to expand...

There are no USB charger out there in the entire world that will provide current higher than 2.4 A per USB port (5V). Only the new USB-C could exceed that limit. I can't tell you why, but it is apparently either not possible or not allowed.
 
silverblack said:
There are no USB charger out there in the entire world that will provide current higher than 2.4 A per USB port (5V). Only the new USB-C could exceed that limit. I can't tell you why, but it is apparently either not possible or not allowed.
Click to expand...

This isn't entirely accurate. Qualcomm's Quick Charge 2.0 protocol allows for 5V3A (i.e. 15W) outputs over standard USB-A, although the device being charged must support the protocol.

Googling for lightning's maximum theoretical charging rate doesn't seem to be proving fruitful though.
 
silverblack said:
Find me such a charger and prove me wrong then. I've looked very hard previously. It doesn't exist.
Click to expand...

There are dozens of quick charge chargers on Amazon. Here's one. Anyway as I mentioned, the device being charged itself must support the QC 2.0 protocol, which isn't many of them. This automatically excludes any iOS device, and most Android devices actually.
 
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masotime said:
There are dozens of quick charge chargers on Amazon. Here's one. Anyway as I mentioned, the device being charged itself must support the QC 2.0 protocol, which isn't many of them. This automatically excludes any iOS device, and most Android devices actually.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure that counts then. But it's good to know. Thanks.
 
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I recall the iPad 3 having similar comments/observations regarding the battery when it came out with it's 11560 mA battery which, combined with the charger, caused long charge times and battery depletion while in use when plugged in.

I remember looking at them in the stores and almost always they were quite warm and the battery was almost dead even though they were permanently plugged in. I noticed the same warmth and red battery warning the other day with an iPad Pro on display at Best Buy.
 
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seadragon said:
I recall the iPad 3 having similar comments/observations regarding the battery when it came out with it's 11560 mA battery which, combined with the charger, caused long charge times and battery depletion while in use when plugged in.

I remember looking at them in the stores and almost always they were quite warm and the battery was almost dead even thought they were permanently plugged in. I noticed the same warmth and red battery warning the other day with an iPad Pro on display at Best Buy.
Click to expand...
Unfortunately the iPad 3 was the worst iPad ever made ....
 
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