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The Holy Grail of battery life: 40% more (on average)

Ultra AleM

Ultra AleM

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jun 22, 2012
678
69
Italy
Hello!

There's a little thing to do that gives you up to 50% of extra battery (according to my tests it's about 30-40% more, on average).

Just disable cellular data while using a Wi-Fi network. Cellular data is used by your phone for MMSs only (which no one uses), so everything will keep working fine. CALLS OR MESSAGES ARE NOT AFFECTED.

Disabling the 3G/4G antenna while using Wi-Fi will dramatically improve your battery life, since this antenna is uselessly used while you're connected to a wifi network (iOS doesn't automatically disable it).

We need a toggle in the control center for cellular data. Why doesn't Apple put it? It would be one of the most useful things that the history of iOS remembers.

I noticed that a lot of people on this forum deny that turning cellular data off can improve your battery life. Well... they didn't test it for sure, since it's a huge improvement.

Let me know.

PS: Obviously, disable the 4G or the 3G antenna, too.
 
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Apple does not put this option in becuase it knows people will forget to turn cellular back on when they leave their WiFi. Even the carrier would not like this. I would not depend on WiFi getting me my phone calls anyway.

I fail to put my charger on my 6+ without at least 50% left in the battery so I need not even consider such drastic measures.

I want my phone to be a partner and help me run my business. I do not want to babysit it.
 
Ultra AleM said:
Hello!

There's a little thing to do that gives you up to 50% of extra battery (my tests give 35-40% more, on average).

Just disable cellular data while using a Wi-Fi network. Cellular data is used by your phone for MMSs only (which no one uses), so everything will keep working fine.

Disabling the 3G/4G antenna while using Wi-Fi will dramatically improve your battery life, since this antenna is uselessly used while you're connected to a wifi network (iOS doesn't automatically disable it).

We need a toggle in the control center for cellular data. Why doesn't Apple put it? It would be one of the most useful things that the history of iOS remembers.

I noticed that a lot of people on this forum deny that turning cellular data off can improve your battery life. Well... they didn't test it for sure, since it's a huge improvement.

Let me know.
Click to expand...

Disabling cellular data will give slight battery life improvements but what's the point? The 6 Plus battery lasts so long that it's not worth it to disable anything. Then even the iPhone 6 battery is good enough to where one doesn't need to go to extremes like turning on and off cellular data in order to make it through the day.

Most people have access to a charger at some point throughout the day or at a minimum, when they get home from work/school or whatever in the evening.

I can only see it being worthwhile in some extreme rare case where one is going to be away from civilization for a few days.
 
CEmajr said:
Disabling cellular data will give slight battery life improvements but what's the point? The 6 Plus battery lasts so long that it's not worth it to disable anything. Then even the iPhone 6 battery is good enough to where one doesn't need to go to extremes like turning on and off cellular data in order to make it through the day.

Most people have access to a charger at some point throughout the day or at a minimum, when they get home from work/school or whatever in the evening.

I can only see it being worthwhile in some extreme rare case where one is going to be away from civilization for a few days.
Click to expand...

According to my tests (I tested an iPhone 4S, an iPhone 5 and an iPhone 6) it is not about a "slight battery life improvement". It's about an average of 40% extra battery life, which is A LOT.
 
Ultra AleM said:
According to my tests (I tested an iPhone 4S, an iPhone 5 and an iPhone 6) it is not about a "slight battery life improvement". It's about an average of 40% extra battery life, which is MUCH.
Click to expand...

But who needs "much" when my iPhone 6 Plus can make it through an 8-10 hour day and still have 50% battery life when I get home? That's my point. It's a waste to disable anything unless you're in some rare scenario in the wild for several days.
 
CEmajr said:
But who needs "much" when my iPhone 6 Plus can make it through an 8-10 hour day and still have 50% battery life when I get home? That's my point. It's a waste to disable anything unless you're in some rare scenario in the wild for several days.
Click to expand...

You're assuming that everybody has an iPhone 6 Plus, while iPhone 6, iPhone 5s, iPhone 5c and iPhone 5 are way more popular.
 
Ultra AleM said:
Disabling cellular data doesn't affect calls.
Click to expand...

Yes it does. In the UK for example, we do not have the capability to receive calls on WiFi. That option is not enabled on our phones/networks.

We can do it through a third party app but it is hardly an integrated solution

Jason
 
JasonHB said:
Yes it does. In the UK for example, we do not have the capability to receive calls on WiFi. That option is not enabled on our phones/networks.

We can do it through a third party app but it is hardly an integrated solution

Jason
Click to expand...

Cellular data doesn't affect calls, which work on the antenna without the data connectivity, which is needed for the internet packages. Try ;-)
 
Ultra AleM said:
Cellular data doesn't affect calls, which work on the antenna without the data connectivity, which is needed for the internet packages. Try ;-)
Click to expand...

Yes, voice and regular (not iMessage) sms don't use cellular data. Still don't think the difference is huge at least for me because the reception in my current office is not great by any means. :confused:
 
decafjava said:
Yes, voice and regular (not iMessage) sms don't use cellular data. Still don't think the difference is huge at least for me because the reception in my current office is not great by any means. :confused:
Click to expand...

Just try, you'll notice a very nice improvement ;-) trust me
 
From the way I understand it is that even if you turn off cellular data the antenna will still be active and pinging the tower letting it know it's there even if you turn off cellular data. If you are already on wifi all data transfers are directed through wifi already (when phone is awake) instead of the cell antenna already and its staying in a low power mode.

Believe me I went all OCD about saving battery life a couple years back and on my iPhone 5 I jailbroke it so I could force it to run on the EDGE network with cellular data turned off seeing if it would save power. I noticed very little difference! The iPhone is very good at managing its cell power usage and every release chips get smaller and more power efficient. Read anantechs review of the iPhone 6 in the cellular section. They talk about how lte transfers are getting very close to parity from a power standpoint to wifi transfers on the 6.

The only thing I can think of that could possibly drain a little more battery with cell data turned on while connected to wifi is that when your phone is put into sleep mode it drops the wifi connection after about 10 seconds or so because hanging on to the cell tower while idle is less power demanding than hanging on to the wifi connection. But if you are receiving lots of push notifications during the time it's asleep there's a chance that it could use up significant power since the cell tower is talking to the phone ramping up it's power for short periods of time. If you turn off cell data and force it to be constantly on wifi then you are using a titch more power in standby because it's never letting go of the wifi connection! It's a double edge sword in some cases!

I just leave mine on and don't worry about it anymore! My iPhone 6 works fine and gets me through the day. My OCD days about battery is pretty much over but it was interesting to me at one point! I get about 7.5 hours usage on screen time on average with mixed usage usually mostly wifi though. That's good for me! My 2 cents. :)
 
imagineadam said:
From the way I understand it is that even if you turn off cellular data the antenna will still be active and pinging the tower letting it know it's there even if you turn off cellular data. If you are already on wifi all data transfers are directed through wifi already (when phone is awake) instead of the cell antenna already and its staying in a low power mode.

Believe me I went all OCD about saving battery life a couple years back and on my iPhone 5 I jailbroke it so I could force it to run on the EDGE network with cellular data turned off seeing if it would save power. I noticed very little difference! The iPhone is very good at managing its cell power usage and every release chips get smaller and more power efficient. Read anantechs review of the iPhone 6 in the cellular section. They talk about how lte transfers are getting very close to parity from a power standpoint to wifi transfers on the 6.

The only thing I can think of that could possibly drain a little more battery with cell data turned on while connected to wifi is that when your phone is put into sleep mode it drops the wifi connection after about 10 seconds or so because hanging on to the cell tower while idle is less power demanding than hanging on to the wifi connection. But if you are receiving lots of push notifications during the time it's asleep there's a chance that it could use up significant power since the cell tower is talking to the phone ramping up it's power for short periods of time. If you turn off cell data and force it to be constantly on wifi then you are using a titch more power in standby because it's never letting go of the wifi connection! It's a double edge sword in some cases!

I just leave mine on and don't worry about it anymore! My iPhone 6 works fine and gets me through the day. My OCD days about battery is pretty much over but it was interesting to me at one point! I get about 7.5 hours usage on screen time on average with mixed usage usually mostly wifi though. That's good for me! My 2 cents. :)
Click to expand...
With LTE and cellular data off you'd get better results. Trust me! You can try.
 
I've been getting great battery life since I did a fresh restore and installed tweetbot and youtube. 2 apps on my phone and it lasts 2+ days. I pretty much gave up on instagram, snapchat and other time wasting social media apps.
 
I've tried this before but have never noticed a difference in battery life. Airplane mode, sure, but disabling cellular data doesn't seem to do anything for my battery life.

Mind, I don't really have a ton of apps using data in the background. My mail is set to manual and I have notifications for almost all apps aside from Phone and Messages disabled. Besides, only time I'm around constant, reliable wifi is at home and I'm not at all concerned about battery usage then since the phone's going to be plugged in and charging.
 
Cellular data isn't being used when WiFi is enabled, I really don't think you are experiencing a gain due to that. With data disabled, the phone is still connected to the tower for calls, texts, and normal pings to the network. The only real way to improve battery life is to put the phone in airplane mode and then enable WiFi.
 
If you are far from cellular tower turning off cellular data and switching to wifi may make big difference.
 
Ultra AleM said:
Just disable cellular data while using a Wi-Fi network. Cellular data is used by your phone for MMSs only (which no one uses), so everything will keep working fine. CALLS OR MESSAGES ARE NOT AFFECTED.
Click to expand...
says who? I use MMS everyday
Ultra AleM said:
You're assuming that everybody has an iPhone 6 Plus, while iPhone 6, iPhone 5s, iPhone 5c and iPhone 5 are way more popular.
Click to expand...
Says the person who assumes no one uses MMS..
 
Well not sure about battery life but I tried it and my call quality went down quite a bit since my carrier uses 3G for their "HD call quality". Not sure this is worth the trade off as at work I don't use my phone except for phone calls and texts since I can get the rest of my info from my desktop. But if it works for you great! ;)
 
CEmajr said:
But who needs "much" when my iPhone 6 Plus can make it through an 8-10 hour day and still have 50% battery life when I get home? That's my point. It's a waste to disable anything unless you're in some rare scenario in the wild for several days.
Click to expand...

quite on the contrary, i'd argue, that it's a waste to let you battery run dry more often and thus waste precious battery-cycles and reduce the lifetime of your battery. on the other hand - i don't bother either, i just turn all battery-sucking crap off, if i really need to (which usually i don't)
 
I used to do this all the time on my 5S while at work, but now on my 6 I don't have to and my battery lasts all day. Plus I really couldn't because my friend has android and sends emojis, which sends as MMS.
 
This is something must people just don't want to have to worry about. Using an iPhone is supposed to be easy and effortless. Not to mention that people do use MMS frequently...your claim that nobody does is bizarre.
 
PDFierro said:
This is something must people just don't want to have to worry about. Using an iPhone is supposed to be easy and effortless. Not to mention that people do use MMS frequently...your claim that nobody does is bizarre.
Click to expand...

maybe in the US but he does have a point, MMS isnt used here at all i think its 39 cent to sent one MMS
 
I'm not sure I understand the point of this when you would need to switch the data back on when you are no longer on wifi. I'm the kind of person who would leave my brain behind if it wasn't inside my head. I don't need the added effort of switching data back on every time I leave wifi. I'm sure I would forget it most of the time. If you are that concerned about battery life get a flip phone and use an iPad mini for all of your "smart phone" needs. This combo would also be cheaper, and likely less labor intensive on your daily life.
 
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