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ShadowJade

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jul 12, 2014
127
167
Am I the only person getting killed on battery life today? Just updated before leaving for work today...I am at 15%. I always get home with 60%+.
 
Yesterday was my first day. Watch crapped out before bedtime. Today, it has been 9 hours off charger so far, and the watch is at 72%. So, my hunch is that you may be getting a first day battery crush.
 
give it a day or so. My first day was dreadful but day 2 was fine.
 
I have been on the OS 3 for a week and my battery life is also poor. I'm going to try @testcard 's suggestion to see if that helps.

EDIT: Done. Is Background App refresh a new feature? I thought the only apps that got refreshed in the background now were the dock apps.

They were all turned on (including some real critical ones like "Timer" and "World Clock"!). I've turned off about a third of them. Will report back on if this makes a difference.
 
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I think it's a new feature, but like you I assumed only apps in the Dock refreshed in the background. Today was my first full day with watchOS 3 after repairing yesterday. So far, so good - after around 14 hours on my wrist I have 48% battery remaining.
 
I think it's a new feature, but like you I assumed only apps in the Dock refreshed in the background. Today was my first full day with watchOS 3 after repairing yesterday. So far, so good - after around 14 hours on my wrist I have 48% battery remaining.
I may try a repairing also. So far, it hasn't affected my use of the Watch, but adding a workout or other intensive use would if things don't change. Thanks for the tip!
 
I have only used AW one day after WOS3 update, as it barely lasted the (work) day and my bicycle commute to work and back (10% battery left). Not impressed.

Of course, I have mostly given up on AW anyway as at least 38mm model doesn't really seem functional to me in terms of battery life; on both marathon and long-distance bicycling exercises, the battery usually either dies or barely lasts to the end of it, leaving me rest of the day without AW (assuming I do not want to charge it during the day, which I do not).

I think I will buy AW#X once there is one that lasts full day of 'workout', and not before.
 
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My first day with I got down to 7 or 8%. Today Yesterday I was back to my usual range and still had 38% left. Of course I was playing with things a lot more on that first day, and I also updated a few apps (including watch apps).

Sean
 
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Hard reboot the watch. Mine did the same thing after I installed the new OS and after hard reboot it returned to normal, maybe even a bit better. When I get home from work after wearing the watch for 9-10 hours (it goes on when I get up) I still have >60% battery
 
Prior to the new OS, I would start the day at 100%, wear it until bedroom TV time at 8pmish...it usually was around 50-60%. I would charge it during the 3 hours of TV, put it back on during sleep, (only want to be awakened by the soft vibration alarm). It would usually be about 95% in the morning, I would charge it up while in the shower and start the cycle again.
A followup to yesterday, I was at 7% when I got out of work, charged to 25% while getting ready to go out. Got back down to 6% by the time I came home. Charged to 100% by 1:30am when done binge watching The Night Of on HBO...wore it till waking at 6:30...it was at 94%. Charged to 100%, took off charger at 7:30. It is now 9:18...I am at 98%. Admittedly not playing with it as much as yesterday when I was setting up my standard usage face and my workout face one face to the right.

Side note, love the new "Now Playing" complication/app that is seperate from the music app...was listening to an audio book with my son, and we follow along in the digital book. Was really nice be able to pause the audiobook to discuss things without leaving the book to enter the audiobook and hit pause, or to attempt a swipe up to access control center to do it, (each swipe up attempt caused a 40 page advancement in the book).
 
I may try a repairing also. So far, it hasn't affected my use of the Watch, but adding a workout or other intensive use would if things don't change. Thanks for the tip!
Success! I unpaired/re-paired the Watch last night. I've had it off the charger since 6 am and its still at 90%. This is much, much better!
 
Prior to the new OS, I would start the day at 100%, wear it until bedroom TV time at 8pmish...it usually was around 50-60%. I would charge it during the 3 hours of TV, put it back on during sleep, (only want to be awakened by the soft vibration alarm). It would usually be about 95% in the morning, I would charge it up while in the shower and start the cycle again.
A followup to yesterday, I was at 7% when I got out of work, charged to 25% while getting ready to go out. Got back down to 6% by the time I came home. Charged to 100% by 1:30am when done binge watching The Night Of on HBO...wore it till waking at 6:30...it was at 94%. Charged to 100%, took off charger at 7:30. It is now 9:18...I am at 98%. Admittedly not playing with it as much as yesterday when I was setting up my standard usage face and my workout face one face to the right.

Side note, love the new "Now Playing" complication/app that is seperate from the music app...was listening to an audio book with my son, and we follow along in the digital book. Was really nice be able to pause the audiobook to discuss things without leaving the book to enter the audiobook and hit pause, or to attempt a swipe up to access control center to do it, (each swipe up attempt caused a 40 page advancement in the book).
Wait, I don't seem to have that complication...is it a specific app or just the Apple Music app?
 
Hard reboot the watch. Mine did the same thing after I installed the new OS and after hard reboot it returned to normal, maybe even a bit better. When I get home from work after wearing the watch for 9-10 hours (it goes on when I get up) I still have >60% battery

This solution from many beta testers including myself fixes the problem.
 
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Restarted mine around lunchtime after I noticed it had gotten down to 55%. After that, it was fine. Didn't bother re-pairing or restoring it or anything, either.
 
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Saturday, battery drain wasn't bad, although it was down below 20% by bedtime whereas it was usually around 40% under watchOS 2. Might have been using power while searching for my phone more often, because I put it in my wife's purse while we were out shopping all day.

For Sunday, I took third-party apps out of the Dock, and we stayed at home. Didn't go out, but we did a couple workout videos, which I logged with the Workout app. Ended the day with around 50%.

I'm not concerned about the battery life with watchOS 3.
 
It's been about 36 hours since I updated my original Apple Watch Sport (38) to WatchOS 3 and so far battery life has been pretty close to 2.2.2 with all background refresh turned off, only a few stock complications, and only a few stock apps in the dock. I'll start slowly adding complications and apps to the dock to see how much of a difference they make...
 
This is annoying: I keep deactivating Background App Refresh for a number of non critical apps and every time I go back, they are toggled back on. I smell WatchOS 3.0.1 soon!
 
The first two days I got more of drain. I'm guessing its because everything was moved and occasionally the watch would come on, showing the last app I had accessed. vs Showing the watch face itself. I turned it off after it charged and now it's fine.
 
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