iPhone Air iPhone Air battery life screenshots thread

[Stev150]

@FeliApple

What do you make of this poor performance from the 17 Pro? iOS 26 to blame? Even more shocking screen time than some screen shots in here!

Post in thread 'iPhone 17 Pro battery life is poor.'
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/iphone-17-pro-battery-life-is-poor.2466890/post-34174640

I’m testing the 17 pro and my battery life has been outstanding , the Air has been better than i thought on WiFi its great , today i switched my sim over and its defo hitting it hard.

I’m so wanting to keep the Air as i love the look feel etc but i think next year i will jump on the Air train

 

[FeliApple]

Honestly it feels a bit stupid, I legit am babying it just to see how long I can make it last today before needing to charge. Brightness I keep low. At points low enough that its tough to read LOL.

All in all I'm happy that what I'm experiencing isn't the norm as I love this phone and hoping it's some software issue or something. I'm not opposed to topping up during a busy day but this is just a bit too much.

Tonight I'm going to try a fresh restore for the first time in geez, I can't even remember. Curious to see how it goes.

Yeah, with low brightness it is just impossible to understand unless… you’re gaming?

What are you using it for?

 

[d245770q]

I would say I’m a pretty heavy user and this is a typical type of day for me. Good or bad?

 

[iLoveMyApple]

I'm perplexed by all the screenshots. I've been using my Air since Friday, though figured first 2-3 days it'll be heavier battery usage than usual (using the phone a lot more than usual, background indexing, etc).

Past few days I've needed to top up quite frequently. I tend to get 3 hours of SOT at the most when battery gets below 20%. Feel like I'm babying the phone and avoiding using it just to see how much I can improve battery life.

Wondering if I should try a clean install and setup everything by scratch, just to test it out. I absolutely adore this phone, I can live without stereo speakers and willing to give up the additional cameras, but boy is battery life killing me.

Today for example pretty traditional day in terms of phone use (I really don't use anything computationally taxing), messages, mail, podcasts (with AirPods), some camera use:

View attachment 2557790

I’m in the same boat as you as far as battery life. I’ve been averaging about 3.5-5 hours of SOT. I don’t know how some are getting 8-9 hours of SOT. I spend about 80% of my day on WiFi. Mostly scrolling TikTok, X, Apple Music in the background. I’m curious to see if any future iOS updates will help resolve this or if there’s a potential hardware issue with my Air.

 

[byron_hinson]

That post showcases the importance of information. That looks appalling, of course, but apart from SOT and battery life used, I have absolutely no information. What did they do with the phone? Cellular or Wi-Fi? Brightness? Heavy settings like mail? Was it a one-off or does the user get that battery life every single day?

No idea - which is why I always mention that information is key, and share my own when I share my battery life results.

Sadly, that post only has that result as relevant. Not much I can say. But hopefully the Air’s results can be explained by what I mentioned earlier - battery size can’t compensate inefficient use, whereas the Air’s efficiency is good for light use. If the entire lineup is like this with real-world use, iOS 26 is worse than I thought.

Battery tests have shown that the 17 Pro Max is actually better than the similar-battery iPhone 16 Plus and 16 Pro Max, so if the whole 17 lineup is compromised it may be difficult to determine why.

There are more of my results. Display brightness is set to auto but usually it is around 35/40%. Most of the day on cellular. But really not much phone usage in my opinion. The deleted app that was on there was Facebook in case that was causing some issues as it seemed to use a lot of on screen and off screen time despite me hardly touching it

 

[Apple_Robert]

I just put my Air on the charger with 30% battery after 27hrs from the last full charge.

 

[ripkord]

Still too early for me to assess properly but for what its worth: 2hrs screen on time, 2 hours of sat nav through crap signal conditions, phone came off charge at 9am and 10 hours 20 mins later I have 65% battery left.

So all I can say at this point is: it easily gets me through a whole 'typical' day.

Seems on par or better than both my 13 pro and 14 pro and I dont remember any battery complaints about those phones oddly enough.

 

[FeliApple]

There are more of my results. Display brightness is set to auto but usually it is around 35/40%. Most of the day on cellular. But really not much phone usage in my opinion. The deleted app that was on there was Facebook in case that was causing some issues as it seemed to use a lot of on screen and off screen time despite me hardly touching it

That looks appalling, but then again, Facebook is a battery killer. 35-40% isn’t high enough to be the sole cause, and the rest of the usage doesn’t seem too heavy.

I don’t know what to tell you, really. It should be far better than that with that usage, unless Facebook is such a nuclear bomb that it killed the battery by itself. I know it’s a battery killer, but since I don’t use it, I don’t know exactly how much.

 

[randystand]

Feels like today has been my strongest day with the battery so far. It had a 10 minute spell on my wireless charger in the Tesla but apart from that has been off charge since just before 7am. Been on WiFi for some of the day, off WiFi for around 5-6 hours. Just usual phone calls, email, social media etc.

Previous days have been worse, yesterday at this time I was on low power mode and yet I’d been on WiFi all day. Feel like it’s getting better as the days go on. But if it stays on today’s figures, I’m fairly happy.

 

[profets]

I definitely think theres something funky happening - I restored from backup, was using light mode and had been averaging around 4 hours SOT on my Air over the past few days.

I wiped, set up as new last night (downloaded contacts etc from iCloud and reinstalled my apps manually) and set it to dark mode - today I'm on track for ~7 hours of SOT based on current numbers. Bit early to draw any concrete conclusions but interesting nonetheless...

I'm going to try that myself too - though I'm not looking forward to spending so much time reinstalling apps I use daily, or customizing so many settings that I've gotten accustomed to over the years.

Yeah, with low brightness it is just impossible to understand unless… you’re gaming?

What are you using it for?

I've never gamed on my phone lol. Majority of time is messages, mail, safari, photos. Secondary would be Books, some scrolling on X, and no other social media. It's weird, I look through all apps usage on battery, all single digits percentages, nothing showing background use, etc. Honestly I hope it's just a one off or weird quirks from my backup restoring to new phones year after year. I'm going to try wiping it soon and setting up from scratch.

just over 12 hours since I took it off charge, and I've used 89% with 2 hours SOT and 3.5 hours screen idle.

 

[Zapdoc]

I'm going to try that myself too - though I'm not looking forward to spending so much time reinstalling apps I use daily, or customizing so many settings that I've gotten accustomed to over the years.



I've never gamed on my phone lol. Majority of time is messages, mail, safari, photos. Secondary would be Books, some scrolling on X, and no other social media. It's weird, I look through all apps usage on battery, all single digits percentages, nothing showing background use, etc. Honestly I hope it's just a one off or weird quirks from my backup restoring to new phones year after year. I'm going to try wiping it soon and setting up from scratch.

just over 12 hours since I took it off charge, and I've used 89% with 2 hours SOT and 3.5 hours screen idle.

View attachment 2558064

 

[Zapdoc]

View attachment 2557908
I’m in the same boat as you as far as battery life. I’ve been averaging about 3.5-5 hours of SOT. I don’t know how some are getting 8-9 hours of SOT. I spend about 80% of my day on WiFi. Mostly scrolling TikTok, X, Apple Music in the background. I’m curious to see if any future iOS updates will help resolve this or if there’s a potential hardware issue with my Air.

iPhone Air first day use On since 07:00 hrs until midnight. now ( 17 hrs) just recharging now at 17%

 

[FeliApple]

I've never gamed on my phone lol. Majority of time is messages, mail, safari, photos. Secondary would be Books, some scrolling on X, and no other social media. It's weird, I look through all apps usage on battery, all single digits percentages, nothing showing background use, etc. Honestly I hope it's just a one off or weird quirks from my backup restoring to new phones year after year. I'm going to try wiping it soon and setting up from scratch.

just over 12 hours since I took it off charge, and I've used 89% with 2 hours SOT and 3.5 hours screen idle.

View attachment 2558064

Yeah, something has to be wrong. That’s the worst battery life I’ve ever seen on an original iOS version, new iPhone.

Something is definitely wrong. Hopefully you can figure it out!

 

[surferfb]

Heavier work-from-phone day today, but still comfortable on battery. I’ll likely end the day in the red, but no need for the battery pack. Currently 4:12 screen on, 3:54 screen idle - phone has been off charge for 13 hours and 15 minutes.

 

[FeliApple]

Heavier work-from-phone day today, but still comfortable on battery. I’ll likely end the day in the red, but no need for the battery pack. Currently 4:12 screen on, 3:54 screen idle - phone has been off charge for 13 hours and 15 minutes.

View attachment 2558188

4h 12 min of SOT 100-35% is poor, but FaceTime and Phone are quite heavy (yes, phone calls are far more draining than, say, MacRumors browsing). Not even with Mobile data should it be that low.


I don’t know, perhaps my usage pattern efficiency just makes me expect too much from every user, but I’m not convinced.

With moderate use I’d expect at least Xʀ-like battery life, I got about 11 hours of moderate, cellular use.

Maybe my expectations are wrong, I don’t know.

 

[rui no onna]

First full day with the Air. Been off the charger for almost 12 hours.

So far, it seems to have similar battery life with same apps and usage conditions (no wifi, 1-2 bars 5G, bluetooth-connected CGM) to my 15 Pro at 93% health which isn't bad. Definitely an improvement over my SE3 which would've probably died by lunchtime.

I dunno how it's calculating screen active time though. When I added up the numbers (include Home/Lock Screen), it was just 1h35m.

 

[Eekamouse]

I am on WiFi all day and battery has been getting better each day today is day 4 of using it and I am very happy with what I am getting. Still have 33% left today with these numbers

 

[surferfb]

4h 12 min of SOT 100-35% is poor, but FaceTime and Phone are quite heavy (yes, phone calls are far more draining than, say, MacRumors browsing). Not even with Mobile data should it be that low.


I don’t know, perhaps my usage pattern efficiency just makes me expect too much from every user, but I’m not convinced.

With moderate use I’d expect at least Xʀ-like battery life, I got about 11 hours of moderate, cellular use.

Maybe my expectations are wrong, I don’t know.

I’m in bed and about to put it back in the charger. I ended day with 21% left. 5:23 SOT and 5:04 idle. Here are the biggest battery users:

This was a phone-heavy day for me, and I’m intentionally not charging my phone while I’m at my desk during my “trial” period. Obviously your mileage may vary - I but this is acceptable life for me; full disclosure: I sit in front of a Mac all work day so I don’t need to use my phone frequently during that time.

I’ll also say, from a non-battery perspective, I have my 16 Pro Max sitting next to the Air on my desk and reach for the Air every time. Once today I picked up the PM and instinctively put it back down and grabbed the air. There is something to be said for preferring using the thing; obviously that doesn’t matter if you’re constantly stressing about battery but for me I think it might push me towards keeping the Air.

 

[Apple_Robert]

I’m in bed and about to put it back in the charger. I ended day with 21% left. 5:23 SOT and 5:04 idle. Here are the biggest battery users:

View attachment 2558256

This was a phone-heavy day for me, and I’m intentionally not charging my phone while I’m at my desk during my “trial” period. Obviously your mileage may vary - I but this is acceptable life for me; full disclosure: I sit in front of a Mac all work day so I don’t need to use my phone frequently during that time.

I’ll also say, from a non-battery perspective, I have my 16 Pro Max sitting next to the Air on my desk and reach for the Air every time. Once today I picked up the PM and instinctively put it back down and grabbed the air. There is something to be said for preferring using the thing; obviously that doesn’t matter if you’re constantly stressing about battery but for me I think it might push me towards keeping the Air.

You are slowly freeing yourself from the beehive and feeling more free. Good on you.

 

[FeliApple]

I’m in bed and about to put it back in the charger. I ended day with 21% left. 5:23 SOT and 5:04 idle. Here are the biggest battery users:

View attachment 2558256

This was a phone-heavy day for me, and I’m intentionally not charging my phone while I’m at my desk during my “trial” period. Obviously your mileage may vary - I but this is acceptable life for me; full disclosure: I sit in front of a Mac all work day so I don’t need to use my phone frequently during that time.

I’ll also say, from a non-battery perspective, I have my 16 Pro Max sitting next to the Air on my desk and reach for the Air every time. Once today I picked up the PM and instinctively put it back down and grabbed the air. There is something to be said for preferring using the thing; obviously that doesn’t matter if you’re constantly stressing about battery but for me I think it might push me towards keeping the Air.

Ultimately, what battery life must not be is annoying. Requiring special care to get through the day, or constant inconvenient replugs, or having to carry battery packs because otherwise it’s impossible, etc.

To give an example, I have an iPhone 6s on iOS 10 that gives me about 6.5 hours of light, efficient SOT on cellular. I have another 6s that was on iOS 9 but that was forcibly updated to iOS 13. I tested it quite significantly. It oftentimes was, with the same light cellular use, at 35% remaining after 2 hours of SOT. In practice, it meant: unplug at, sat, 7am. Plug in again with 30% at 1pm. Unplug at 4pm with 100%. Plug in again at 8pm with, say, 50%. That got very annoying, very quickly.

But if that battery life is enough for you, consistently, then I think there’s no question.

If your daily SOT is about 4 hours, then the Air will be enough practically every time. In the odd case it isn’t? You can always plug it back in, since it isn’t an inconvenience for you. You mentioned picking up the PM and instinctively putting it back. Comfort and ease of use beats superfluous battery life every single time.

 

[kamikazeeMC]

Main apps Safari, Reddit and Xiaohongshu

 

[James6s]

Using less battery so far today as I’m not out and about on 4/5G taking a tonne of photos like yesterday morning.

 

[mouzouris]

Trying out a full day on the low power mode just to see how much better it is.

For a demanding day you can get away with a full day battery using the low power mode.

 

[profets]

That’s interesting too, see how much it can last under low power mode. I tend to do that on busy travel days.

I restored my phone and set it up from scratch last night. Kind of a nice way to clean and take a different approach to Home Screen setup. Keeping it a bit simpler and only installing apps I’m actually using.

1 hour, into the day, 30 minutes SOT and battery down to 85%. Feels rough but also figure gotta let it go through few days of indexing and background tasks to settle down. I hope. Otherwise I’m going to change this phone. Something doesn’t seem right with this battery.