iPhone 15 Models Feature New Setting to Strictly Prevent Charging Beyond 80%

[MrCrowbar]

Better than my automation that notifies me when battery has reached 80% and I can decide if I wanna leave it on or disconnect it from the charger.
This and the cycle count only being available on the 15 tells me there's some issue with battery longevity on these models.

 

[Egregius]

Of course this is true. Google it. You'll find thousands of articles about it.
A lithium-ion battery is most comfortable at room temperature charged at 50%. The further you go from the 50% in either direction the more stress it receives. The last 20% in both directions are the most stressfull and are best avoided when possible.

 

[MacCheetah3]

I always felt I did pretty well with the traditional “fully uncharge, fully charge”.

A little more than five years and about 1000 full charge cycles to drop below 80% estimated battery health. (iOS currently estimates 75%.)

Coincidentally, the 79% in the Jan. 2023 log was the same as what iOS was reporting.

With that said, I think, it’s time for another reminder of how battery state is far from simple, it’s an ongoing guesstimate.

BU-602: How does a Battery Fuel Gauge Work?

BU meta description needed...

batteryuniversity.com

Battery Calibration - iFixit Support

All newly-installed smart batteries should be calibrated as soon as possible. This helps your system get an accurate reading on the battery’s state of charge. W

help.ifixit.com

is this actually healthy for the battery? I know for a fact that keeping the phone charged at 100% for a long time is definitely harmful to the battery but is it good to never charge past 80%? doesn't that kill the battery cells that are never gonna be used inside the battery? as far as I'm concerned batteries like to be constantly drained and charged on a loop.

It’s not unhealthy for the battery. However, such charging habits make measuring (i.e., accuracy) even more difficult — visit the earlier links.

Also, to all the proponents of self-replaceable batteries out there - when have you actually recycled a used up rechargeable battery?
I don't support the high prices on the battery replacement service at Apple, but I think that sending the old battery back for recycling should be mandatory under at least a minimal penalty to the users exchanging it by themselves.

In addition to probably not recycling (or at least properly disposing), as seen prominently in this thread, plenty of iPhone users are not only willing but mandating they have the battery replaced unreasonably soon — yes, I am in full support of Apple telling you to p**s off if the battery health isn’t estimated below 80%.

To paraphrase Men in Black, “The human is smart, people are dumb, panicky, selfish, shallow minded, and you know it."

Next year's new feature: Now lets you limit charging to 70%

Technically, 50 to 60% is the optimal ‘holding’ charge level.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT2...t sun exposure, for extended periods of time.

What I want is a mode where the phone is not charging while plugged in. Would be extremely useful for CarPlay not killing my battery. IIRC some new Samsung phones support this.

That's exactly where this setting is for.

Pretty much. It’s for when having a battery-equipped device connected to an external power source for long periods of time. As stated above, 50 to 60% would be most optimal, but 80% has been the accepted compromise.

 

[anshuvorty]

Wait, I still don't understand. In the original article, it noted that there are 3 options:

• Optimized Battery Charging
• 80% Limit
• None

The 80% limit option is obvious on what it does - it charges your phone to 80% and leaves it there. Optimized Battery Charging does it what it does, and charges your phone to 80% very quickly and then, slowly trickle charges it 100%.

Does the "None" option mean that your phone will rapidly charge to 100% or charge to 100% like a normal phone battery?

What does MR mean when they say that "All of the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro models feature a new battery health setting that prevents the devices from charging beyond 80% at all times when enabled?"

 

[MrCrowbar]

Is this speculation or is there any actual data behind this? I ask because my 11 Pro is down to just 94% and, aside from turning Optimized Battery Charging on, I don't do anything else to "preserve" battery life. It gets wirelessly charged to 100% every night.

In general lithium ion (notably Lithium polymer) have substantially more internal resistance above 80% so the charger has to slow down to avoid heating things up and the last couple percent are a struggle for both battery and charger. A different effect happens below 20% of charge, it's degrading the materials that make up the battery. Ideally you wanna keep it around 50% and at colder (think basement) temperatures. Keeping the phone in your warm pocket is not the best, set it on your desk when you can. Charging it in the car while using it for navigation right under the hot windshield for long trips is probably the worst thing people do. 100% charge, heat from outside, heat from the chip, great.

I can highly recommend a tool named "al dente" for Mac, it's an icon on the menu bar and you can set the maximum charge percentage there. I keep mine slightly above 50 unless I plan on doing a lot of stuff away from desk.

 

[GigabitEthernet]

How odd, I wrote that I've been doing this manually for years and got laughed off this site.

I guess I was right and they were wrong. Shocking.

 

[Termy]

As a Tesla owner this setting just makes sense and it would have been great to have this 3 years ago.

It’s absolutely fascinating reading the comments of people who do not understand that charging to 100% is extremely bad for the battery. Hilarious how some people can get so upset over a setting 😂😂

Imagine telling those people that it is better to only charge their car to 80% even though they just need 10% of charge every day 😂

 

[dk001]

My days can be crazy at times and I always start my day with a fully charged device no matter if it is an iPhone or one of my Android devices. Charges on a stand overnight.

My car handles the nav and other items thought I can turn on AA or CP - usually do that just for calls. GPS on rare occasions. I have wireless charging in my vehicle but only use it if needed. As someone mentioned, a shortcut to limit charging doesn’t always work.

Not a bad idea for Apple to put this in play as long as it works as advertised and educates the user on the use cases. Personally I will seldom if ever use this. Now fast charge … that I would love to see on an idevice.

 

[ignatius345]

What is the point of any battery if charging past 80% causes excessive wear and tear. Same with EV’s. Just plain dump. I want the full capacity always, so develop battery technology that does that.

They're working on it, to be sure. But what we have today is lithum batteries and the chemistry can only do what it can do.

 

[ignatius345]

It’s absolutely fascinating reading the comments of people who do not understand that charging to 100% is extremely bad for the battery.

You can have your iPhone battery replaced for free under AppleCare, or for a pretty minimal charge if you don't have AppleCare. It's considered a consumable part. Some people truly do need 100% of their battery life on a given day, and replacing the battery every couple years is just part of the deal.

 

[N5SSH]

I loved the feature on the Watch Ultra and am glad that it is coming to the 15. I am currently waiting on my order to process and hopefully enjoy that feature as well. I can't help to wonder though if you could use one of those smart switches like those from TP-Link and plug a charger into that. Set up a Shortcut on the phone to turn the charger off once the battery level reaches 80%. I haven't tried this but I do have a shortcut that texts me once the phone reaches 80% and I usually read that on my watch to take action.

 

[Karma*Police]

Do you complain the roads are limited to 60mph when your speedometer goes to 140mph?

Ah, yet another car analogy that actually isn’t analogous.

 

[Ethosik]

People obsess about battery too much IMO. Charge it when you want, even to 100% and if you end up needing a new battery in 6 years then that’s fine.

I do NOT want to lose 20% immediately (more like losing 40 of the battery since it can’t drop below 20). I always keep my phone high charge in case of emergencies.

I learned this lesson a while ago when we had a big pop up storm and had to take shelter. Nothing on radar. Nothing from news in the morning of potential storms. So nothing I could have prepared for. My phone was at 30%. NOT GOOD! As I was on phone calls and monitoring which significantly drained the remaining 30% and my phone died.

So ultimately, I’d rather be prepared at all times when I can so I keep my phone charging when ever I can. I’ll take maybe replacing battery in 6 years (if I keep my phone that long) instead of artificially limiting to only 60% battery capacity anyway. That a lot of battery missing to only keep my phone between 20 and 80.

 

[SVTmaniac]

I get a new iPhone every year so I really don’t care what happens to the battery. My 14 pro max is currently at 91% of maximum capacity which is still 11% more than 80% of a charge when it’s charged to 100% and I’ll be replacing it in just a couple months. I guess if you’re one to keep your phone for more than a year it might matter. 🤷🏻‍♂️

 

[Apple_Robert]

BTW, this feature was added to all Apple Silicons MACs with new firmware update on Ventura. You can limit battery charge to 80%. When enabled, Mac always charges to 80% and not more.

See: https://github.com/actuallymentor/battery/pull/163

Feature must be enabled manually by editing specific SMC key. There is no GUI in Settings app in Ventura. AlDente doesn't yet support this feature.

AlDente supports charging to whatever percent you want.

 

[Ethosik]

Seems silly. Lots of people get a new phone every year. What’s the point? #dumb

My iPhone 12 Pro is being replaced this year. So I’ve had it 3+ years and charge it every night no matter the battery level and it’s at 86% maximum capacity. This feature is some Apple BS.

Yep! Just think with this feature you treat you new iPhone at day one at 60% battery capacity. Since you artificially limit to only 80-20 range.

 

[imola.zhp]

When they rolled this out to apple watches last year (which I wasn't aware of until very recently) they rolled it out all the way back to the S7... So don't tell me they can't do the same for older iPhones. This is horse $hi+.

 

[rimi]

What is the point of any battery if charging past 80% causes excessive wear and tear. Same with EV’s. Just plain dump. I want the full capacity always, so develop battery technology that does that.

Agreed. If charging above 80% is really a bad thing the battery should be big enough and this should be hard coded into it. Therefore 80% is what we should see as 100%. Remove the complexity from the use side. Should be just plug and play.

 

[Karma*Police]

Do you really think Apple cares whether you use the full 100% or just 80%? They are giving you the option. If you don’t want it, don’t use it.

Obviously they care because they’re giving people the option. And they’re giving people the option because battery performance degradation is a major problem for many people, and has been for a very long time.

Stop being a fanboy and expect more. Apple has contributed surprisingly little to battery tech considering how much they spend on R&D and the importance of battery life to UX and longevity of their products.

Or, they can go old school and allow users to swap batteries for cheap.

 

[Razorpit]

What they need is an option to hold your battery at 80%, show 80% as 100%, and then over time as your battery depletes, increase the percentage it charges to. So, for instance, when your battery drops to 95% health/capacity, it charges to 85% to make up for that, so that your battery life is at least consistent over time. And on a phone like the iPhone Pro Max, you could do this without it impacting most people. On smaller phones, it might be nice to get a battery bump before they implement that option.

I think my DJI drone does something similar. It will fly on 0% for a while if you keep forcing the return to home activation off. It will beep at you like crazy with all kinds of warnings but you can force it for a bit. I think by default it only uses a certain percentage of the battery, and I think that's because it needs to keep the peak voltage high enough to power the motors. Kinda like how over time the iPhone can't operate at peak performance during heavy usage spikes.

So if Apple was able to put a battery in the iPhone with a higher capacity rating, they could just mark the charge level in software by default at 80% but display as 100% and then have a deep menu override setting for advanced users, pop up a message about how disabling this may reduce the iPhone battery lifespan, and then disable it for those who just want the most battery life and only use their phone for a year or two. But even for me on my 14 Pro Max, after a year, my battery health is at 88% and I use optimized charging. I imagine after two years it's not going to be great. In past years I don't remember my iPhone battery grinding down this much in a year since I'm on the iPhone Upgrade Program, and I almost exclusively use MagSafe charging which is slower than wired but also might produce more heat? Before this year it was a mix of wired and wireless, and before that it was mostly slower charging wireless 7.5W with some wired mixed in. I will need to start tracking this over time.

Agree 100% but think of marketing departments. 😄

Tesla would never sell another car once people found they should only use 60% of their battery's capacity on a regular basis.

 

[Razorpit]

We have a 3 and a Y. We charge to 80%. I know you’re joking, but I only drive about 50 miles per day (primarily shuttling the kids to school and back). And I can charge in the garage overnight (or any time really) so no need to charge to 100% or even 90%.

That's awesome. I wish I could do that. I can think of at least 3 times in the last 2 weeks I would have been either sitting on the side of the road, or twiddling my thumbs at a charging station.

 

[Superrenz]

Stupid question: If I limit charging to 80%, it needs to see the charger sooner and more often. What is worse for the battery: more charging or less charging to 100%? Expertise appreciated….

 

[Menneisyys2]

I mean, I totally get why this can’t be rolled out to older models of the iPhone, especially the iPhone 14 range as that’s so inferior to the 15.

Normal Apple BS and hopefully they make it available to those of us who won’t be getting the 15 this year.

particularly if you take into account that Apple's every second word is "carbon neutral". By NOT helping us lengthen the battery's useful life by (if we want to) reducing the max. charge level, it's Apple greed that results in a lot of additional e-waste.

 

[Ifti]

My iPhone 13 Pro without any safety measures is after 2 years at a 88% capacity. That’s still 8% more than you choose with this option. 😂

This is actually a very good point!

 

[lordhamster]

This is a very cool feature for people who obsess over battery health. The more I think about it though, the less utility I think it will have for me. My iPhone 12 Pro Max is at 90% battery health 3 years after I got it charging it without any regard or care.

If I use this feature, my brand new phone will be nerfed to 80% capacity from day one. So in hopes of avoiding a battery that can’t charge past 80% in 4-5 years, I would artificially prevent my battery from charging past 80% on day one?

I suppose for people who hang onto their phones for 5-10 years this could make sense. For my use case where I probably would wait at most 4 years before upgrading the phone or replacing the battery this feature really doesn’t have a purpose.

On my laptop on the other hand, I could see this as being valuable.