iPhone 12 battery draining fast

I have been experiencing the same thing with my 12 Pro. I have it at 93% before I go to sleep and when I wake up in the morning it drains down to below 50%. I tried swiping up all my apps, turning background app refresh off, and turning off precise locations and nothing is working. I too feel like it might be a defective battery issue as this has not happened to any of my previous iPhones.

After 4 days of experiencing normal battery behavior, I can now confidently say that resetting the network settings truly resolved my battery drain issue.

Since resetting the network, battery on idle overnight has been like this and I’m talking about 8-12 hours of standby:

Night 1 - 2%

Night 2 - 3%

Night 3 - 7%

Night 4 - 4%

You mean you have the dual sim capable iPhone 12, but you have inserted only 1 sim, and you did a reset of network settings, and the battery issue resolved ?

I also use the dual sim version but I used both slots (2 sim cards inserted), the battery issue occurs only with both lines activated.

I have tried everything. Network setting reset, hard reset and ultimately the very last possibility a full restore using my Mac. Nothing helps, the battery drain is still excessive when using dual sim. Since my return window is already closed I’m stuck with it. Apple support is no help at all. This is annoying and I’m actually considering for the first time since 2007 buying a Pixel.

Your curve looks terrible, though different from some others including me using dual sim. If you’re within the 14 days return period, return it. I’m in contact with Apple support but they have no clue. I suspect it’s a serious issue.

I experimented last night. I turned off a SIM card and immediately Idle consumption dropped from 4-5% per hour down 0.5% per hour. Now I sit expectantly and wait for what will happen to my consumption but it seems to rise again after activation of SIM 2.

I thought it was just me! This iPhone is draining fast! I turned off 5g and background refreshes. This is unacceptable for a phone I paid $1500 for. I’m incredibly fearful that this isn’t a case by case issue and more of a widespread battery issue.

In one day, I find I’m charging the phone at least twice. This is ridiculous.

I have been experimenting all day with different settings. I see no problem if I deactivate one of the SIM cards.

If I set the physical SIM card as the default data SIM, no problem. Normal idle battery consumption, around 0,5% per hour.

But if I set my eSIM as the default data SIM then the phone starts to idle with 4-5% per hour in battery consumption.

Feel free to try it too and see if you notice the same thing.

I will try out the 14.3 beta and see if that fixes anything. If not, I will sell my phone and go to Android. Sorry, but Apple is no longer "just works." Their support is garbage, too. I wasted already way too much time troubleshooting this. 

Same here. Even my restore did not fix the problem. Apple support has no clue. I bought a Pixel to use with my second line as this problem is frustrating. I gotta say the Pixel just works!! And I’m an iPhone user since original iPhone. If they don’t fix it with 14.3 I’ll sell my iPhone and move to Pixel...never thought I would say this.

I’m experiencing the same behavior. Even a full restore through my Mac did not fix the issue. Makes me wonder if it’s indeed hardware related. Otherwise it must be a software bug but this means everybody with an iPhone 12 pro is affected who uses dual sim.

Outside Apple, Pixel is the ONLY best alternative. Not a bad choice at all, but don't give up on Apple yet. The 11 series appears to be unaffected by this issue. Honestly I'd pick the 11 Pro/Max over the Pixel though.

Which iPhone do you have?

I appreciate your input, I’ll definitely try that however I strongly doubt that’s the case.

latest test. After restore only Telekom Germany eSIM active with LTE only. Charged to 100% at 9pm woke up at 6am with still 100%. Next night same charging but with second line physical sim Vodafone Italia actively. Both lines active second line no data network. Battery drain same time period 20%.

I’ll try the same and reverse the active lines and report back.

I’m aware that iOS got a different charge indicator than Android. However if I have less battery or the same as on my iPhone SE 2020 there is something wrong.

i have the iPhone 12 Pro 128gb.

I know some people have already tested the widgets, BUT DUDE, I was reading this post all night before sleep yesterday and I know that I had reset network settings maybe a week ago, so decided to try removing the widgets from my home screen and see what happens overnight. GUESS WHAT?! 1% lost overnight with apps left on the background!

F! widgets 🖕🏼. If you have them on your home screen REMOVE them right now! When I bought my 12 pro graphite I thought to put some on my screen at top and bottom so it looks cool on my new phone but boy if I knew it was eating my battery like that I would have thrown them in the garbage a long time ago.

I don’t know if people already tried this and it’s still eating their battery but I just wanted to say this worked for me. 👏🏼

I’ve been keeping logs over the nightly drain. This is my results during the last 7 days. This is the drain at night during about 7 hours of no screen on time, and iPhone laying face down on my nightstand.

43% -> 26% = -17%

64% -> 37% = -27%

72% -> 68% = -4%

76% -> 71% = -5%

76% -> 73% = -3%

69% -> 64% = -5%

46% -> 33% = -13%

I’ve had a few days with almost normal drain, but then this morning it had lost 13%.

The battery app always reports no usage during the night even if the drain is high. Using a single e-sim. Last night it was in low power mode while all other nights has been in normal mode.

Now while 13% lost last night is not extreme, it’s still a sign that something is wrong. Especially since it was in LPM and there are no apps reported to have been used either on screen or in the background. It’s likely some internal OS process going haywire and wasting CPU cycles and hence not visible in the battery app.

I’m thinking (and hoping) this is a software issue which is fixable with an update. If this were a hardware issue I would expect the nightly drain to not differ so much between nights.

Sadly, coming from cheap Android phones I expected better from an iPhone than this. Really hoping for a fix soon.