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Level 1

0 points

3GS - incredibly poor battery life

I've had each generation of iPhone since they were launched in 2007, and upgraded from my 3G to the new 3GS a week ago on the day of its release. My experience with the battery life has been really, really poor. So bad that I sought out this forum yesterday and decided to run the battery down to zero just to see how poor its life was.

Here's what happened:

Yesterday I kept it plugged in and charged at 100% until 6 PM. I used it for ~2 hours of reading using the Kindle app and quick view of 1-2 web pages. This morning I woke up and read the news using a news reader app for ~1 hour before it turned itself off when it reached 1%.

Stats were 3 HOURS and 7 MINUTES of usage to drain the battery to ZERO. That was without calls, without video, without iPod use.

When I'm using it I can literally watch the power meter (which I've turned on the numeric percentage readout for) drain about 1% when I actually take any action on the device. I feel offended and mislead by Apple because the 3GS was supposed to have improved battery life. My netbook has better battery life (6 hours with extended battery while running its built in 3g mobile broadband service the whole time), and that's a full computer.

If you've had similar issues I'd like to hear about them and would certainly welcome any solutions that don't involve tweaking so many settings that the device doesn't work in it's default mode.

I'm recharging from the zero mark now. If the same cycle happens after another charge I feel like I'll have to return it to Apple after wasting a lot of time and simply move back to my 3G.

Given the amount of traffic on the forums about this issue, I think Apple had better speak up or they are going to experience a lot of damage to their brand.

iPhone 3GS, iPhone OS 3.0

Posted on Jun 27, 2009 6:49 AM

380 replies

noney82

Level 1

0 points

Jul 1, 2009 12:42 PM in response to Felix Leiter

how do i put my phone back to a new phone? im getting the same problems. i charge from 11 pm to 7 am. this morning it was 100% i had a quick look on the app store while sat in some traffic(5mins max0 the battery was then on 94%. sent a few texts today played a quick game of flight control at about dinner time 5-10 mins then by the time i looked at the phone again at 5pm it was on 24% ***

kenkneeb

Level 1

0 points

Jul 5, 2009 10:55 AM in response to Bruno Fracassa

Same Here! Brand New, 1st time iPhone owner. I picked up my 3gs on Thurs., July 2nd, charged it overnight, used it a fair amount friday, Jul. third totally exhausted battery life (didn't use anywhere near the 600minutes talk or anything else even remotely close, recharged the depleted batt. Frid night, barely used it yesterday but batt was showing nearly discharged, charged it overnight, took it off the Apple wall charger this am, batt. didn't even show half full... Can you say RECALL!!! I called 1-800MyApple, "There is a 20 minute wait to speak to an Apple representative," My arse there is. I hung up. Called ATT store, "No one is currently avail." voice jail/VOR response. What a load of crap. $700 phone (bought it out of contract) can't even hold a charge. *****! HELP APPLE, HELP! I'm a 25+ year Mac Customer/User. Love your stuff. Please fix your obviously known batt. issue, NOW!!!

Jul 5, 2009 12:04 PM in response to kenkneeb

I have the same issues. Requiring a minimum 50% charge to make it through the night and still have battery power in the morning, completely on standby. Disabled all services, still have massive battery drain. I bought the Time Jot App to test up time. I am losing roughly 20% battery life in 1.5 hours with no use. Completely on standby.

There are obviously defective batteries being distributed.

Set an appointment with the apple store. They'll replace it.

A conspiracy theorist might also posit that there is some level of IPhone 3G refurb parts making up the build of the new 3GS, but that's just ridiculous...

Also, I noticed the same 20-minute wait period quote on AppleCare, but was transferred to a rep immediately. I think that they are trying to lighten their load.

bdobson

Level 1

28 points

Jul 5, 2009 1:23 PM in response to ahawkinson

I charge mine every night but typically by the time I get home from work (I have a long commute) I am at about the 20% mark. This is a huge change from other phones but none of them had the capabilities of the iPhone 3GS so the comparisons would not be valid.

I have a feeling that the upcoming 3.1 upgrade is going to have a number of things to address battery life, etc.

Jul 5, 2009 1:52 PM in response to ahawkinson

I'm not having any problems with battery life, or overheating. My first charge lasted 10.5 hours (75 hours standby), my second 19 hours (80 hours standby, 13% charge remaining), almost entirely playing music. If I subtract out the standby drain, I probably would've gotten about 29 hours of music time off of one charge - pretty close to the official claims.

For the 19 hour cycle, I had 3G off, location services off, and wifi mostly off. Mail was set to manual fetch. No calls.

Now to try something a bit more demanding, like reading an eBook... and try it with 3G enabled, to see how much that adds to the standby drain.

I don't doubt that many of the folks posting here are seeing really poor battery performance, either due to defective batteries or to apps that waste power. But those problems aren't universal.

Jul 5, 2009 3:08 PM in response to sward.dsl

sward.dsl wrote:
I'm not having any problems with battery life, or overheating. My first charge lasted 10.5 hours (75 hours standby), my second 19 hours (80 hours standby, 13% charge remaining), almost entirely playing music. If I subtract out the standby drain, I probably would've gotten about 29 hours of music time off of one charge - pretty close to the official claims.

For the 19 hour cycle, I had 3G off, location services off, and wifi mostly off. Mail was set to manual fetch. No calls.

Now to try something a bit more demanding, like reading an eBook... and try it with 3G enabled, to see how much that adds to the standby drain.

I don't doubt that many of the folks posting here are seeing really poor battery performance, either due to defective batteries or to apps that waste power. But those problems aren't universal.

I got about 24 hours of iPod play until drain, but that was with the speakers off mostly but a few hours of playing through my stereo. The screen was asleep during playback about 95% of that time.

What were you doing during your 10.5 hour cycle? With normal use I'm probably averaging 4 hours usage. A 3G phone call will eat it. Maps will too. I can't imagine using mine normally and getting 10.5 hours, that is, a moderate amount of Safari, Maps, Weather, YouTube, Music, bluetooth calls, check mail, etc. - you know, what I bought the phone to do.

Jul 5, 2009 3:46 PM in response to Graphics Bong

The 10.5 hour cycle was about 2 hours of moderate network activity (new phone fiddling) - setting up email, playing with the camera, adding a few apps. 3G was on throughout, and wifi for brief periods. Location services was off except for a short period playing with maps.

The rest was music, with periodic email updates.

Jul 6, 2009 2:51 PM in response to sward.dsl

I found that I could extend my battery life from 11 hours to 25 hours by disabling WiFi and Push Notifications.

I left location services on, because they are useful.

I believe that WiFi is the main culprit for massive battery drain.

Jul 6, 2009 3:09 PM in response to Alex Bard

Alex Bard wrote:
I found that I could extend my battery life from 11 hours to 25 hours by disabling WiFi and Push Notifications.

I left location services on, because they are useful.

I believe that WiFi is the main culprit for massive battery drain.

Same here. Didn't see much difference between Push and Fetch 15 mins, but turning off Wifi had a big benefit.

Just put wifi on when I need it now.....not often enough to justify having it on all the time.

sidssp

Level 1

101 points

Jul 6, 2009 3:49 PM in response to Alex Bard

Interesting. I am going to give it a try. Did you turn off 3g as well?

Jul 6, 2009 5:45 PM in response to ahawkinson

Can any of you explain what's a "full software restore without backing the phone up from your previous one"?

Jul 6, 2009 7:52 PM in response to sward.dsl

Got 10.5 hours (9% left, 28 hours standby) again, this time with 8-9 hours spent reading ebooks (BookShelf app). So the screen was lit for more than 8 hours of that time. It would probably have been good for 10-12 hours reading, if there were no other demands on the battery.

Jul 6, 2009 7:56 PM in response to muddy2big

That is the same as a new phone. If you haven't done so yet, the 3.0 software for the 3GS will download to iTunes. Use the Restore button and you'll be on your way. After it is restored, you will be given the choice of using a backup or a new phone when it is recognized in iTunes. Choose new and then select which items, contacts etc. you want on there. Then you get to reload all your music, etc. Make sure you copy down what all your settings are for email and other important items because it takes the phone back to as if you never have used it.

Ciao.

Jul 6, 2009 9:05 PM in response to ahawkinson

Here is my current battery life on my Iphone:

http://i667.photobucket.com/albums/vv38/venom74799/IMG_0025.png

Jul 6, 2009 9:07 PM in response to ahawkinson

Here is my current battery life on my Iphone:

http://i667.photobucket.com/albums/vv38/venom74799/IMG_0025.png

I don't feel its very good at all considering about 3 hours were used for music through headphones and the rest was between wi-fi web surfing for about 1 1/2 hours and watching some podcast on here for about 28 minutes

3GS - incredibly poor battery life