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iPad 7th gen poor battery life and performance

I recent bought a iPad 7th generation to replace an old iPad Air. The battery life is significantly less than the specs claim. My daughter watched downloaded movies for 2.5 hours and then played Minecraft for 0.5 hour and the battery was dead. And the performance is also poor, it frequently stutters in Minecraft, although given my iPad Pro sometimes stutters in Minecraft, maybe that isn't a surprise. Is there something wrong with it and should I go into the Apple store, or is this just normal. I only realized after I bought it that it is using a phone processor from 2016.

iPad

Posted on Aug 18, 2020 8:24 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Aug 18, 2020 11:32 AM

Was the iPad's battery fulyl charged up before you started using it?

Leaving the iPad's screen near or at maximum brightness will ALWAYS have a severe negative impact on battery life!


Tap on the link below to my iDevice/iOS performance/optimisation/battery optimisation user tips link.


Slow iPad on iOS 9, 10 or 11! - Apple Community


Try all of these tips and leave each tip active together.

DO NOT simply try every tip individually, expecting just one tip to be a performance “cure all”.

Many of these tips are designed to work together to help improve overall iOS/iDevice performance/battery performance.


In addition, Minecraft is a pretty heavy duty computer/iOS device hardware resource hog.

Try playing this came with little to no extra apps hanging in the iOS App Switcher.

Minimise the use of Notifications, Set iOS Mail app to fetch mail less often.

Keep background computing and activity processes to a minimum, whenever/wherever possible!


Lots of other great tips in my performance tips link.



Good Luck!



7 replies
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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Aug 18, 2020 11:32 AM in response to Hank400

Was the iPad's battery fulyl charged up before you started using it?

Leaving the iPad's screen near or at maximum brightness will ALWAYS have a severe negative impact on battery life!


Tap on the link below to my iDevice/iOS performance/optimisation/battery optimisation user tips link.


Slow iPad on iOS 9, 10 or 11! - Apple Community


Try all of these tips and leave each tip active together.

DO NOT simply try every tip individually, expecting just one tip to be a performance “cure all”.

Many of these tips are designed to work together to help improve overall iOS/iDevice performance/battery performance.


In addition, Minecraft is a pretty heavy duty computer/iOS device hardware resource hog.

Try playing this came with little to no extra apps hanging in the iOS App Switcher.

Minimise the use of Notifications, Set iOS Mail app to fetch mail less often.

Keep background computing and activity processes to a minimum, whenever/wherever possible!


Lots of other great tips in my performance tips link.



Good Luck!



Reply

Aug 19, 2020 9:41 AM in response to Hank400

Actually Apple states UP to 10 hours of battery life, with a comprehensive disclaimer

Your mileage may vary.


  1. Testing conducted by Apple in August 2019 using preproduction iPad (7th generation) units and software. Testing consisted of full battery discharge while performing each of the following tasks: video playback, audio playback, and internet browsing using Wi‑Fi or cellular data network. Video content was a repeated 2‑hour 23‑minute movie purchased from the iTunes Store. Audio content was a playlist of 358 unique audio tracks purchased from the iTunes Store. Internet over Wi‑Fi and cellular data network tests were conducted using dedicated web and mail servers, browsing snapshot versions of 20 popular web pages, and receiving mail once an hour. All settings were default except: Wi‑Fi was associated with a network (except for internet browsing over cellular data network); the Wi‑Fi feature Ask to Join Networks and Auto‑Brightness were turned off; Brightness was set to 50%; and WPA2 encryption was enabled. Battery life depends on device settings, usage, and many other factors. Battery tests are conducted using specific iPad units; actual results may vary.



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Aug 18, 2020 11:36 AM in response to Hank400

There is nothing wrong with this 7th gen iPad model.

The iPhone 7 A10 Fusion CPU handles all of the new and advanced features of iPadOS just fine!

My wife's iPad 7th gen works great, but neither her or I play any hardware resource intense games, either.

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Aug 19, 2020 4:11 AM in response to MichelPM

It was fully charged and Wifi was off as we were in a car. Not sure of the brightness setting. On another day in the car, when she didn't play minecraft and merely watched downloaded content, it lasted less than 4 hours. The stated battery life is 10 hours of watching movies, so my experience is so far from this that it seems like there is a problem. My 2018 Air lasts much longer and even the old 2014 Air that it replaced seems to last longer. I my attempt to do a run down test just looping a movie to see what that achieves. But at the moment it is not fit for the purpose for which it was bought.

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Aug 19, 2020 4:16 AM in response to MichelPM

While the A10 may handle iPadOS just fine, when you look at how the iPad is marketed, as something capable of playing the latest games in a manner that is "fluid and incredibly detailed", then the inability to do this with minecraft, one of the world biggest games, is not really achieving what they are claiming it can do.

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Aug 19, 2020 9:48 AM in response to Hank400

So, to get maximum battery life out of that iPad, I suggest following my instructions in my tips link and start putting them to good use.

If you use ANY iPad at or near full screen brightness, expect battery life to drop significantly while using any iPad.

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iPad 7th gen poor battery life and performance

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