14.6 draining my battery

This article may help:

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208387

You’re confused with the terminology (which is what Apple want for people to continue to power the network) and the actual setting functionality

‘Find My’ is what Apple call the service now, you can still find your own devices if you have the ‘network’ setting switched off, that is what enable other people to find their devices and drains your device battery because it switches on your device beacon which allows you to find your device even if it’s off because it operates in low power mode

iOS/iPadOS 14.6 drains battery life due to the Bluetooth and U1 chips constantly pinging for the ‘Find My’ network to work, eg AirTags! Apple need to add an option in the system location settings to disable/opt out of this otherwise I’m sure they’ll face a class action lawsuit over it

"Find my network" is on iPhone and iPad from iOS 13 in order to search therm with cellular or wifi turn off, so the problem isn't for the search of Airtags. The feature could have some bug, but it isn't liked with the new Airtags.

Up to iOS 12 the setting was called ‘Find My iPhone’ from iOS 13 Apple renamed it ‘Find My’ in preparation for AirTags with the sub setting ‘Find My Network’ but this was actually the previous ‘Find My iPhone’ setting which also included the ability to find Apple and Beats earphones that use W and H chips plus the Apple Watch as they have Bluetooth transmitters in them that can be used as beacons to be found

iOS 14.6 split these setting further by changing the name back to ‘Find My iPhone’ for the actual iPhone or iPad and keeping ‘Find My Network’ but now this setting controls the iOS device as a relay for AirTags and with more accuracy for devices that have U1 chips (iPhone 11 and above) which is why everyone’s battery is taking a noticeable hit, the Bluetooth and U1 chip are constantly pinging to support the Find My network for Apple and this setting is on by default

Apple’s answer for this is to give iPhones a bigger battery in the next iPhone 12S/13 to bring it in line with what it was before iOS 14.6 for the previous generations

No. “Find my” is a thing, “Find my Network” is another thing.

From iOS 13 and macOS Catalina “Find my Network” works to find iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad, Mac when you haven’t cellular data active or they are not connected to the Wi-Fi, using Bluetooth or Wi-Fi direct to device. From iOS 14.5 the same function is used to find AirTags or the third part devices that use “Find My Network”.

you are confused. The network Find my there was last years with iOS 13, in order to find all Apple device even they are offline. The same working to find airtags now.

I have activated it from iOS 13 and I haven’t had problem with battery.

As I have already explained this functionality was not available in iOS 13 ONLY the original ‘Find My iPhone’ functionality which they renamed ‘Find My Network’

AirTags only work with iOS 14.6 and above because this functionality is enabled, the new ‘Find My Network’

Long story short I was having battery drain issues since upgrading to iOS 14.6, my iPhone 12 Pro Max only lasted about a day until I thought about how all these new features work which knowing how the original settings were my original message here said they need to add the option to opt out of the ‘network’ but I didn’t know they had added it deeper into the settings

Since turning off the ‘network’ setting my iPhone battery last nearly 2days again and my iPads also last days longer in standby

Try this; 

Settings -> tap Apple ID -> tap Find my -> tap Find my iPhone -> turn off ‘find my network’