The watchOS 10 battery life thread [MERGED]

[saneryee]

Series 4. With 10.3, at 66% 2.5 hours after a full charge. Didn’t have such drain previously; usage habits unchanged.

Series 4, Updated to 10.3, at 45% 2h after a full charge.
Reset, Repair, didn't work.

With version 10.2, the battery life on my watch was fine.

Now, my watch spends most of its time charing, only used for workouts and short outings.

Do not update to 10.3!
Do not update to 10.3!
Do not update to 10.3!

 

[yangcy]

Turn off the useless walkie talkie feature. took my battery life from 6 hours to 12. it uses multicast, which drains the battery.

Good morning !
I remind you of what I said here in October: deactivate "Daylight exposure time" in Privacy (Watch application) and if the option was active, you will notice an improvement in autonomy !
After deactivating this option, I found almost the same autonomy offered by watchOS 9.

Disabling these two gave me back an awesome battery life on my S7 so far. I highly recommend turning these two things off (i.e. if you're not actively using them), they eat the battery like crazy.
I'm currently at 84% battery health and got the watch going from 3.15pm Friday till ~11pm Saturday, no excessive use though - a few walks around the city, standard health monitoring.

Disclaimer: I was getting roughly 24hrs on 10.2.x and earlier, so there is something wrong with 10.3.

 

[weeesss]

I updated to 10.3 the night before last since my battery life on my Ultra1 had decreased. Since updating, my battery life is back to "normal" leaving me at 66% after 24 hours.

 

[chriswhv6]

Ohhh wow look at the surprise I got this evening when I placed my Watch on the charger!!!

Finally after months of it disappearing the max charge limit activated again.
Question is will it be a one off now???

 

[Tevosn]

Disabling these two gave me back an awesome battery life on my S7 so far. I highly recommend turning these two things off (i.e. if you're not actively using them), they eat the battery like crazy.
I'm currently at 84% battery health and got the watch going from 3.15pm Friday till ~11pm Saturday, no excessive use though - a few walks around the city, standard health monitoring.

Disclaimer: I was getting roughly 24hrs on 10.2.x and earlier, so there is something wrong with 10.3.

I disabled it this morning +temperature sensor, which I don’t use anyway.
The last 15 hours it used 27%, which I think is too much still.

 

[rbart]

All these recipes are not guaranteed to work ...
Most people have no battery issues without disabling that.
A lot of people have final assumptions:
- don't install X.Y, it eats the battery
- disable Z, it fixes the issue

There is no generic solution, no generalized issue, it's all specific cases. It costs nothing to try, but don't expect to much about magic recipes.
The only possible generic fix is to erase both watch and iPhone and restart as new

 

[GLS]

I'm an extreme scenario (5 different apple watches, all synced to my phone...S5 7 8 and 9). All of them started exhibiting rapid battery drain not long after 10.2 came out. I tried a variety of the usual things (unpair/pair, background app refresh, etc). The one thing I found that caused the drain, at least in my experience....was the Solar Analog face. I like that face, and swapping it for a different (California) face increased battery life dramatically.

There was no reason for my S8 SS to go from 100% to 81% in 90 minutes. Swapping out the face changed it to 2% per hour battery use.

 

[mrcemento]

I'm an extreme scenario (5 different apple watches, all synced to my phone...S5 7 8 and 9). All of them started exhibiting rapid battery drain not long after 10.2 came out. I tried a variety of the usual things (unpair/pair, background app refresh, etc). The one thing I found that caused the drain, at least in my experience....was the Solar Analog face. I like that face, and swapping it for a different (California) face increased battery life dramatically.

There was no reason for my S8 SS to go from 100% to 81% in 90 minutes. Swapping out the face changed it to 2% per hour battery use.

You are a genius! Apple Watch 9, 1 month old, not lasting a full day. Changed the Solar face and now I’m 73% after a full day.

 

[Howard2k]

I love the solar face and use it on my Ultra outside of working hours. I may try another face and see if there’s a difference in battery life, thanks.

Edit: this one right?

 

[SnyG]

At this point there’s no reason for me to wear my S7. I’m used to finishing the day with around half battery (and I have to charge daily, with an office job, which isn’t great in itself).

Came off full charge before work this morning, it is now down to 7% and literally dropping every minute. It’ll be dead within the next half hour, if not sooner.

 

[Tevosn]

After updating to 10.3 today, i’m pretty optimistic.
I haven’t payed that close attention to the batter yet, but the drain appears to be down to 34/35% in a day.

 

[GLS]

I love the solar face and use it on my Ultra outside of working hours. I may try another face and see if there’s a difference in battery life, thanks.

Edit: this one right?

View attachment 2343187

Correct. That face drains my battery more than any other.

I have a S9 that I bought late fall. Came with 10.1; I was using 1-2% battery per hour (while not working out). When 10.2 came out, I installed it...and went to 5-8% per hour or more.

Figured it might just be a quirk, so did the usual stuff. But my other watches on 10.2, using this face, drained the battery more as well.

FYI, 10.3 does it as well. I like the face, and maybe they will fix the drain with it down the road. Alas.

 

[ndouglas]

impossible for me to tell if the first week or two of this 10 update in October was way worse, or i just got used to having to charge it 2x a day. Series 7. Still a useful tool for me, but ugh, a high maintenance one.

Thank goodness for the magnetic vs plug-in charging though, that would likely be too much for me to handle if it weren’t so easy to use compared to lighting and USB chargers.

Edited to add:
Battery health keeps dropping slowly but surely… 86% is a “long” way to go to 79% but if the trend continues with the same pace, by the time they announce the Series X or 10 or whatever it’s called in Sept., perhaps I can qualify for a replacement if the new model doesn’t offer anything amazing.

 

[Howard2k]

Correct. That face drains my battery more than any other.

I have a S9 that I bought late fall. Came with 10.1; I was using 1-2% battery per hour (while not working out). When 10.2 came out, I installed it...and went to 5-8% per hour or more.

Figured it might just be a quirk, so did the usual stuff. But my other watches on 10.2, using this face, drained the battery more as well.

FYI, 10.3 does it as well. I like the face, and maybe they will fix the drain with it down the road.

For what it’s worth. It doesn’t seem to affect battery life for me in any material way. I did 49 hours with my regular cycle, which is Modular Ultra during working hours and Solar Analog during non working hours and weekends. So I had California for 48 hours straight and no real difference. Just throwing ther out there as a data point, it doesn’t seem like the same sceaneio for everyone obviously.

FWIW California is my second favourite face after Solar Analog.

 

[Elviss116]

my battery life increased afeter last update.


Apple watch s6 40mm
battery life : 92%

 

[ndouglas]

my battery life increased afeter last update.


Apple watch s6 40mm
battery life : 92%

Increased!? From what?… In any case that’s cool… interesting… and pretty good for a series 6…. Do you notice it lasting longer at all?

 

[Elviss116]

Increased!? From what?… In any case that’s cool… interesting… and pretty good for a series 6…. Do you notice it lasting longer at all?

Usually, when I charged it in the morning at 9:00 (100%), by the afternoon (18:00), I had 70%, and with the new watchOS, I have 80%

 

[cigz]

After Apple forced me to update my S8 watch to OS10 I can see why people complain about battery life...
I put my watch on a charger everyday at around 9pm and on OS9 there were days I used to have 60-70% battery left (AOD off, doing nothing just on my wrist getting notifications).
On OS10 it went down to 30-40% battery left. If I had AOD on, that watch would be dead by 9pm.

Getting sick of the updates Apple is pushing. First iOS 17 trashed my iPhone 13 Pro Max and now OS10 my watch.
And please keep in mind battery health on my watch is at 98%...

 

[mikelets456]

Disabling these two gave me back an awesome battery life on my S7 so far. I highly recommend turning these two things off (i.e. if you're not actively using them), they eat the battery like crazy.
I'm currently at 84% battery health and got the watch going from 3.15pm Friday till ~11pm Saturday, no excessive use though - a few walks around the city, standard health monitoring.

Disclaimer: I was getting roughly 24hrs on 10.2.x and earlier, so there is something wrong with 10.3.

Thanks for this information. Although this has helped a little bit, I'm still getting "more than normal" drain. I used to drop about 2.5% per hour, now it's about 4%-5% or so per hour. On a Apple watch 7 and 15 PM 17.4...any other suggestions?

 

[Anaxarxes]

After Apple forced me to update my S8 watch to OS10 I can see why people complain about battery life...
I put my watch on a charger everyday at around 9pm and on OS9 there were days I used to have 60-70% battery left (AOD off, doing nothing just on my wrist getting notifications).
On OS10 it went down to 30-40% battery left. If I had AOD on, that watch would be dead by 9pm.

Getting sick of the updates Apple is pushing. First iOS 17 trashed my iPhone 13 Pro Max and now OS10 my watch.
And please keep in mind battery health on my watch is at 98%...

I'm thinking that the battery life indicator on Apple Watch is not accurate - and this benefits apple.

Apple only replaces the battery for a cost of 99 USD if the capacity is less than 80%. If your capacity is more than this, you pay something like 200 USD!

I have a 4 year old AW5, it's "stuck" at 81% cap for a year...

 

[mikelets456]

Is there a way to install an older version to my Apple watch? Because this horrid battery life is unacceptable.

 

[cyberbiker6]

I installed the watchOS 10 RC last week and apparently it's the same as the final version… now, with watchOS 10 my battery life is down to less than 12hrs.

0n 12 March I installed the 10.4 update on my Apple Watch 8 and experienced the batteries life drop as well. The last attempt to recharge caused me to wake up with zero battery power so the data was not posted. I’ve now turned off Wi-Fi to see if it improves.

Here is the specific data.

• 100% 150706Mar WiFi & Loc Off.
xx% 162305Mar WiFi On & Loc.
• 100% 120848Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
39% 122054Mar WiFi On & Loc. 12.1 ~17.04
• 100% 111042Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
0% 120730Mar WiFi On & Loc. 20.8 ~20.8
• 100% 091012Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 110800Mar WiFi On & Loc. 45.8 ~50.89
• 100% 062236Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 081412Mar WiFi On & Loc. 39.7 ~44.11
• 100% 050806Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 062118Mar WiFi On & Loc. 37.2 ~41.33
• 100% 031612Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
xx% 050636Mar WiFi On & Loc. 40.4 ~44.89
• 100% 012130Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 031418Mar WiFi On & Loc 40.8 ~45.33

 

[mikelets456]

Since changing a few items as suggested earlier I’m better than it was but not how it was before 10.4
Yesterday charges to 100% and took off the charger 7:02am and was at 36% by 10:30 pm.
Today took off at 100% at 8:50 am and at 8:30 PM I’m at 53%.
I’m not constrain my watch but to look at texts, time and forward a few songs and get health info.
This is acceptable compared to what it was. I used to be at 63% by day’s end

 

[cyberbiker6]

0n 12 March I installed the 10.4 update on my Apple Watch 8 and experienced the batteries life drop as well. The last attempt to recharge caused me to wake up with zero battery power so the data was not posted. I’ve now turned off Wi-Fi to see if it improves.

Here is the specific data.

• 100% 150706Mar WiFi & Loc Off.
xx% 162305Mar WiFi On & Loc.
• 100% 120848Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
39% 122054Mar WiFi On & Loc. 12.1 ~17.04
• 100% 111042Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
0% 120730Mar WiFi On & Loc. 20.8 ~20.8
• 100% 091012Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 110800Mar WiFi On & Loc. 45.8 ~50.89
• 100% 062236Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 081412Mar WiFi On & Loc. 39.7 ~44.11
• 100% 050806Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 062118Mar WiFi On & Loc. 37.2 ~41.33
• 100% 031612Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
xx% 050636Mar WiFi On & Loc. 40.4 ~44.89
• 100% 012130Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 031418Mar WiFi On & Loc 40.8 ~45.33

I updated the 10.4 on March 12 and my battery life dropped by over half on my watch 8. Then the battery life returned to watchOS 10.3 levels once I switched off the toggle at Settings>Wifi. Note the record below.

• 100% 150706Mar WiFi & Loc Off.
10% 170118Mar WiFi On & Loc. 42.2 ~46.89 hrs
• 100% 120848Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
39% 122054Mar WiFi On & Loc. 12.1 ~17.04 hrs
• 100% 111042Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
0% 120730Mar WiFi On & Loc. 20.8 ~20.8 hrs
• 100% 091012Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 110800Mar WiFi On & Loc. 45.8 ~50.89 hrs
• 100% 062236Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 081412Mar WiFi On & Loc. 39.7 ~44.11 hrs
• 100% 050806Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
10% 062118Mar WiFi On & Loc. 37.2 ~41.33 hrs
• 100% 031612Mar WiFi On & Loc Off.
xx% 050636Mar WiFi On & Loc. 40.4 ~44.89 hrs

 

[Tricky22]

I used to be able go for a run using a app for zero to 5k, now my watch dies after 20 mins, dispite being on 80% when I start.