iPhone battery drain after updating to iOS 16.3

I have the same issue. iPhone 13 Pro. It's held battery life like a champ, usually lasting for days at a time before needing a charge. Now, after upgrading to iOS 16.3, my battery is visibly draining throughout the day. I now need to charge at least once if not twice a day, even with most applications closed.

I'm angry. Apple just made my new $1300 phone just as good as my iPhone 7 that I just got rid of ... please fix this ASAP!

Jzic2 wrote:

I thought it was me but yes unbelievable battery drain. I can see the battery going down by the minute it loses one percentage all the time. Thought it was my phone and battery but it’s still ok. Unbelievable they force us to take an update and take away battery use

What you need to understand is that it is a problem with YOUR PHONE, not with the release version. Hundreds of millions of users have updated to the latest version and do NOT have a battery drain problem, so the only logical conclusion is that it is something not right in your phone, which you need to troubleshoot.

Here is general information about battery management→iPhone Battery and Performance - Apple Support

Specifically, the most basic steps - test for a day or two after each step:

• Force-restart your phone→Press and quickly release Volume Up then Press and quickly release Volume Down then hold the SIDE button until an Apple logo appears (15-30 seconds) -
• Back up your phone, then restore your phone to Factory settings: How to back up your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch - Apple Support, Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod to factory settings - Apple Support
• Restore your backup→Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch from a backup - Apple Support

The standard answer isn’t the answer. Battery drain is much more noticeable after the update regardless of the other settings mentioned. The battery life, with the brightness & WiFi, weren’t this bad before the update.

I have done these. But what is odd that right after I did the update I started having the issue with battery drain and the only thing that changed was the iOS my phone used to last almost all day now it is only about 3 hours and I am down from 100% to about 30% when I barely use the phone.

Jldkxo wrote:

I have 16.5.1 on my brand new iPhone 14. I’ve had this phone for three months. Since the update, which was a week or so ago, my battery has been awful. It was lasting all day and now I’m lucky if I get three hours. And I’m talking it’s going from 80% to 20% in a matter of minutes. It sat in my purse all day while I was taking a course. It was 100% when I started the course then went down to 20% not even four hours later when I went on break and took it out of my bag. It wasn’t overheating and it was in a very cool, air conditioned room. I’ve checked my battery health, it’s at 98%, then I checked all my apps and none are running in the background. What is going on!? How can it drop that much after not being used!! Even my old iphone, which I had for years and the battery was crap, wouldn’t drain that fast.

Have you tried the encrypted backup and restore? This process seems to fix the battery drain issue for some people. It was mentioned in another thread, by another user. Here is a screenshot of the post:

The links appear again below:

Link for how to Back up and Restore: Back up and restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch to your Mac or to iCloud - Apple Support

Link for putting iPhone in DFU Mode: If you can't update or restore your iPhone or iPod touch - Apple Support

Good Luck!

Note: Non of the above is my material. Any credit goes to the User who wrote it, and who is depicted in the screenshot.

Hello Morebugs,

If you're experiencing issues with the battery in your iPhone draining faster than expected, we'd suggest checking your settings and adjusting them to improve battery life. Have a look at the suggestions below:

Optimize your settings.

There are two simple ways you can preserve battery life — no matter how you use your device: adjust your screen brightness and use Wi‑Fi.

Dim the screen or turn on Auto-Brightness to extend battery life.

- To dim, open Control Center and drag the Brightness slider to the bottom.

- Auto-Brightness adjusts your screen to lighting conditions automatically. To activate it, go to Settings > Accessibility. Tap Display & Text Size, then turn on Auto-Brightness.

When you use your device to access data, a Wi‑Fi connection uses less power than a cellular network — so keep Wi‑Fi on at all times. To turn on Wi‑Fi, go to Settings > Wi‑Fi to access a Wi‑Fi network.

Next, we'd suggest taking a closer look at your battery usage to get a better understanding of what's using you battery, and adjust some additional settings based on your findings:

View Battery Usage information

With iOS, you can easily manage your device’s battery life, because you can see the proportion of your battery used by each app (unless the device is charging). To view your usage, go to Settings > Battery.

Here are the messages you may see listed below the apps you’ve been using:

Background Activity. This indicates that the battery was used by the app while it was in the background — that is, while you were using another app.

- To improve battery life, you can turn off the feature that allows apps to refresh in the background. Go to Settings > General > Background App Refresh and select Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi & Cellular Data, or Off to turn off Background App Refresh entirely.

- If the Mail app lists Background Activity, you can choose to fetch data manually or increase the fetch interval. Go to Settings > Accounts & Passwords > Fetch New Data.

Location and Background Location. This indicates that the app is using location services.

- You can optimize your battery life by turning off Location Services for the app. Turn off in Settings > Privacy > Location Services.

- In Location Services, you can see each app listed with its permission setting. Apps that recently used location services have an indicator next to the on/off switch.

Home & Lock Screen. This indicates that the Home screen or Lock screen was displayed on your device. For example, the display was awakened by pressing the Home button or by a notification.

- If an app frequently wakes your display with notifications, you can turn off push notifications for the app in Settings > Notifications. Tap the app and set Allow Notifications to Off.

No Cell Coverage and Low Signal. This indicates either that you are in a poor cell coverage area and your iOS device is searching for a better signal or that you’ve used your device in low-signal conditions, which has affected your battery life.

- You can optimize your battery life by turning on Airplane mode. Open Control Center and tap the Airplane mode icon. Note that you cannot make or receive calls while in Airplane mode.

You'll find these suggestions and more information here: Batteries - Maximizing Performance - Apple

If you need further assistance with the battery life issues you've noticed, you'll want to reach out to Apple Support directly. They're best-equipped to take a closer look and provide some additional guidance. This link will help you get started: Contact - Official Apple Support

Take care.

CraigRD wrote: "It’s happened to my XR (80% capacity) after the update to 16.3!..."

CraigRD ~ 80% is weak and is to be expected after years of use and charging cycles. 80% is also the level at which Apple suggests replacing the battery. A weak battery will not be able to supply sufficient power to the iPhone's antenna to connect with cell tower signals.

Also, the long process of applying an iOS update to an old iPhone XR with a weak battery at 80% can be the proverbial "straw that broke the camel's back." ...So have the aging battery replaced and all will (probably) be well:

iPhone Battery & Power Repair

About genuine iPhone batteries

Repair Provider Verification

(Articles found by searching Apple's Knowledge Base.)

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azar114 wrote: "...New battery..."

azar ~ Was the battery replaced by a qualified technician using a genuine iPhone battery?...

About genuine iPhone batteries

Repair Provider Verification - Official Apple Support

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niblue121 wrote:

Apple why don’t you admit the latest IOS Apple update is draining the battery. I had no problem until this update. We used to be able to delete your ridiculous updates. Can’t do that anymore!

First, because Apple doesn’t participate in the user-to-user forum. Second, because it isn’t draining the battery; something else is. See→The last update killed my battery! - Apple Community

It is so told that the phone takes about 3 to 4 days (usually) with indexing process, after any major update, and this consumes large amount of battery. However, after few days the battery is supposed to resume back to its normal performance. Please share your experience with us.

It is so told that the phone takes about 3 to 4 days (sometimes about a week) with the indexing process after any major update, and this consumes large amount of battery.

However, after the said few days, battery is supposed to resume back to its normal performance. Please share your experience with us, if this is true in your case or not.

Thanks for the warning. I am still on 16.2 for 13- and hesitant to update. My phone already doesnt hold a charge all day - and I have almost all apps closed until I need to use; etc etc. What's the point in having apps if you have to shut them off; oh and not use cell data but only wifi- then the phone is useless when you can't be geo-tied to a wifi connection.

Morebugs ~ The long process of applying an iOS update to an old iPhone with a weak battery can be the proverbial "straw that broke the camel's back." So...

Does your iPhone XR still have its original battery?

And what's the Maximum Capacity % here?...

Settings > Battery > Battery Health & Charging

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Same with Xs. The latest 15 was excellent in sense of battery, since 16 battery drains super-fast, some point 16.1 fixed, 16.2 broke again, 16.3 fixed the problem partially, but not even comparable with latest 15. Anyway with 16.3 everyday charge is needed vs with 15 it was once in 3 days. No any usage, but power goes down constantly. Battery health percentage fits to Apple recommendations, so it’s pure iOS bug.