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iPhone 17 Battery Life Comparison: 6+ Hour Improvement Over iPhone 16

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The iPhone 17 models have much longer battery life than the iPhone 16 models, with the exception of the iPhone Air because there's no comparable iPhone 16 model. Battery life is up six hours for most devices, with the iPhone 17 seeing the most significant increase.

iphone-17-models.jpg

Streaming video can be played for longer, and the iPhone 17 models support longer video performance, according to year-over-year comparisons of iPhone 16 battery life and iPhone 17 battery life listings provided by Apple.

  • iPhone 17 - 30 hours video playback, 27 hours streaming video playback.
  • iPhone Air - 27 hours video playback, 22 hours streaming video playback.
  • iPhone 17 Pro - 33 hours video playback, 30 hours streaming video playback.
  • iPhone 17 Pro Max - 39 hours video playback, 35 hours streaming video playback.
  • iPhone 16 - 22 hours video playback, 18 hours streaming video, 80 hours audio.
  • iPhone 16 Plus - 27 hours video playback, 24 hours streaming video.
  • iPhone 16 Pro - 27 hours video playback, 22 hours streaming video.
  • iPhone 16 Pro Max - 33 hours video playback, 29 hours streaming video.

The iPhone 17 lasts for an impressive eight hours longer than the iPhone 16 for video playback, and nine hours longer for streaming video.

Battery life will vary depending on device usage, which is why Apple uses "up to" in all of its battery descriptions. You may see longer or shorter battery life based on how you use your iPhone, because most people aren't often watching video for 39 hours in a row.

The iPhone 17 models support fast charging and can reach a 50 percent charge in 30 minutes, much like the iPhone 16 models.

Article Link: iPhone 17 Battery Life Comparison: 6+ Hour Improvement Over iPhone 16
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2025/09/09/iphone-17-battery-life-comparison/
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Why do they give us these numbers in video playback speak? It’s all under their controlled conditions with everything but WiFi turned off and brightness at a minimum. Show me what an average day looks like with cellular on, push emails, tons of texts and messages, and teams calls. These numbers they give mean nothing.
 
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I know these are Apple numbers, but stories of Abysmal iPhone Air Battery Life hasn't really eventuated. Even though I have an iPhone 16 Pro Max it's the iPhone Air that excited me this year. First time in a long time a new model has done that. My wife is due for an upgrade and wants a lighter phone than her 14 Plus but doesn't want a small screen. This could be the phone for her.
 
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DMG35 said:
Why do they give us these numbers in video playback speak? It’s all under their controlled conditions with everything but WiFi turned off and brightness at a minimum. Show me what an average day looks like with cellular on, push emails, tons of texts and messages, and teams calls. These numbers they give mean nothing.
Click to expand...
It’s standard way to quantify something. Hard to define average usage, what’s average could be light for some one or heavy. Too many variables to quantify. Not every one has teams calls or text messages or what ever. Not every one uses Microsoft teams, it’s more on corporate side.
 
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jdoyle said:
I know these are Apple numbers, but stories of Abysmal iPhone Air Battery Life hasn't really eventuated. Even though I have an iPhone 16 Pro Max it's the iPhone Air that excited me this year. First time in a long time a new model has done that. My wife is due for an upgrade and wants a lighter phone than her 14 Plus but doesn't want a small screen. This could be the phone for her.
Click to expand...
The best thing to do is ignore the naysayers who haven't used the phone and weren't going to get it. Purchase the phone and make use of the 14 day window. That way, you can make an informed devision based on your wife's usual day to day usage.
 
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Where did all this extra battery improvement come from? Battery seems to only be about 3% larger and we're still on 3nm for the main SoC.

Just improvements from efficiency in the N1 chip and screen maybe?
 
MacRumors said:


The iPhone 17 models have much longer battery life than the iPhone 16 models, with the exception of the iPhone Air because there's no comparable iPhone 16 model. Battery life is up six hours for most devices, with the iPhone 17 seeing the most significant increase.

iphone-17-models.jpg

Streaming video can be played for longer, and the iPhone 17 models support longer video performance, according to year-over-year comparisons of iPhone 16 battery life and iPhone 17 battery life listings provided by Apple.

  • iPhone 17 - 30 hours video playback, 27 hours streaming video playback.
  • iPhone Air - 27 hours video playback, 22 hours streaming video playback.
  • iPhone 17 Pro - 33 hours video playback, 30 hours streaming video playback.
  • iPhone 17 Pro Max - 39 hours video playback, 35 hours streaming video playback.
  • iPhone 16 - 22 hours video playback, 18 hours streaming video, 80 hours audio.
  • iPhone 16 Plus - 27 hours video playback, 24 hours streaming video.
  • iPhone 16 Pro - 27 hours video playback, 22 hours streaming video.
  • iPhone 16 Pro Max - 33 hours video playback, 29 hours streaming video.

The iPhone 17 lasts for an impressive eight hours longer than the iPhone 16 for video playback, and nine hours longer for streaming video.

Battery life will vary depending on device usage, which is why Apple uses "up to" in all of its battery descriptions. You may see longer or shorter battery life based on how you use your iPhone, because most people aren't often watching video for 39 hours in a row.

The iPhone 17 models support fast charging and can reach a 50 percent charge in 30 minutes, much like the iPhone 16 models.

Article Link: iPhone 17 Battery Life Comparison: 6+ Hour Improvement Over iPhone 16
Click to expand...
Other than the iPhone Air, the base 17 and Pro models support 40W+ wired charging. So 50% in 20 minutes. Likely, they’ll hit 45W, because Apple always underquotes wired charging speeds.
 
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Would love to see battery life comparisons using the phones as hotspots for other devices... My 512 gig 16 Pro battery life struggles with hotspot mode, especially if it's connected to anything Bluetooth at the same time. The actual streaming video time is much shorter than the 24 hours advertised if it's 4K content especially if it's over cell network not WiFi... On the flip side, it lasts longer than advertised for regular phone calls over your network and wifi audio calls if you have a good signal. I feel like the everyday real world battery life between the 16 and 17 lineup is marginal at best... I actually just upgraded from my ancient iPhone 8 64 GB (had it for seven years!) and the 16 Pro feels very solid I like it. Haven't had my battery get lower than 10% yet, but I do keep a charge pack with me for emergencies and recording 4K at 60fps.
 
DMG35 said:
Why do they give us these numbers in video playback speak? It’s all under their controlled conditions with everything but WiFi turned off and brightness at a minimum. Show me what an average day looks like with cellular on, push emails, tons of texts and messages, and teams calls. These numbers they give mean nothing.
Click to expand...
They use controlled conditions to eliminate variables so you can better do comparisons between generations. Most people aren't nerds and just use their phone to watch videos. Here is the actual improvement. Take your actual usage on the old device and increase it by these numbers to find your new numbers, roughly:

  • iPhone 16 to 17: 36.36% longer video, 50% longer streaming
  • iPhone 16 Pro to 17 Pro: 22.22% longer video, 36.36% longer streaming
  • iPhone 16 Pro Max to 17 Pro Max: 18.18% longer video, 20.69% longer streaming
What this tells me is that the bigger gains seem to be on the streaming side, which likely means that the new Apple N1 chip is doing a lot of the heavy lifting here when it comes to efficiency gains. This is a promising start for their new networking stack, as long as it is reliable. We'll see. But it will be interesting to see future versions of the C chip and how it can also help here in terms of performance.
 
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Video playback feels like such a strange metric to me on phones.

I mean, I know people do it, but do folks tend to exhaust their battery doing it?
 
daveymacdaveface said:
Does anyone truly believe the iPhone 17Air will have the same battery life as the iPhone 16 Pro?
Click to expand...

No, we seen this with the iPhone 12's. They market that it that had the same battery life as the previous year, even though they all have smaller mAH batteries. It did not! It was one of the worst battery life on a iPhone, that's why they fixed it on the 13's and so on.
 
turbineseaplane said:
Video playback feels like such a strange metric to me on phones.

I mean, I know people do it, but do folks tend to exhaust their battery doing it?
Click to expand...

Lots of people are watching shorts all day.
Although that probably uses more energy than what apple does.
 
ls1dreams said:
Where did all this extra battery improvement come from? Battery seems to only be about 3% larger and we're still on 3nm for the main SoC.

Just improvements from efficiency in the N1 chip and screen maybe?
Click to expand...
How bout the all new cooling system inside? I’m sure that has something to do with it!
 
Paddle1 said:
The thing about that is the standard 17 is able to drop to 24Hz for movies with ProMotion to save battery while the 16 is stuck at 60Hz.
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100%. This is the biggest reason for it having the greatest increase in battery. Even when the regular and Pro models had nearly identical batteries, the Pro always had notably better battery life, regardless of whether you used Apple’s numbers, or from reviews.

And the ability to operate at 10Hz or less is the main benefit of ProMotion. Everyone swears that their ProMotion screen looks better all the time, but it’s not true. A ProMotion screen may not even ramp up above 60Hz if you’re scrolling at normal speed. 🤷🏻‍♂️

And you certain don’t need 60Hz for movies.
 
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Paddle1 said:
The thing about that is the standard 17 is able to drop to 24Hz for movies with ProMotion to save battery while the 16 is stuck at 60Hz.
Click to expand...
Not just for movies. The frame rate will drop during all sorts of normal use. The battery improvements of ProMotion is real.
 
I don't really understand how in the world it is possible that the 17 has a better battery life than the 16 Pro... how? And 17 Pro even is also not THAT much better. If anyone can do an ELI5 for me, I would really appreciate it.
 
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