Apple Watch battery drain after Update

I noticed my Apple Watch battery draining very quickly after updating it to 9.5.1. Anyone else? My battery usually lasts 2 days.


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Apple Watch Series 7

Posted on Jun 4, 2023 1:10 PM

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Posted on Jun 4, 2023 1:26 PM

Most people are seeing better battery life after 9.5.1. Did you restart your watch, after updating it? If no, restart your watch. Then give it a couple days as after any OS update, your watch has to reindex all of its data, which depending on how much memory you're using, can take a couple days.

113 replies

Jun 27, 2023 2:00 PM in response to RitaSweete

On my iPhone, I went into the "Watch" application, then "General" and finally "Diagnostics logs". There were a few files, among which a "contactsd.cpu_resource-2023-06-27-172949.ips" log file containing this message about the contactsd process :


90 seconds cpu time over 172 seconds (52% cpu average), exceeding limit of 50% cpu over 180 seconds


It seems that the contactsd process could be the culprit, eating too much CPU and hence battery.


Could other people with the same issue check if they also have this error message ?

Sep 26, 2023 2:04 AM in response to RitaSweete

This is from pascal_sartoretti hopefully its help. Coz it works for me


I have had the same problem a few months ago (after a watchOS update), and again last week when upgrading to watchOS 10. In both cases, I solved it like this (see also my previous posts much above) :


  • Un-pair the watch
  • Re-pair the watch
  • Restart the iPhone
  • Restart the watch


It works, but it is a hassle : I lost the watch configuration each time and had to do it again by hand.


It is obviously a software problem, it affects many people and has lasted for a few months at least.

Sep 28, 2023 8:28 PM in response to RitaSweete

This is from pascal_sartoretti hopefully its help. Coz it works for me


I have had the same problem a few months ago (after a watchOS update), and again last week when upgrading to watchOS 10. In both cases, I solved it like this (see also my previous posts much above) :


  • Un-pair the watch
  • Re-pair the watch
  • Restart the iPhone
  • Restart the watch


It works, but it is a hassle : I lost the watch configuration each time and had to do it again by hand.


It is obviously a software problem, it affects many people and has lasted for a few months at least.

Sep 29, 2023 9:13 PM in response to RitaSweete

What I did is follow pascal_sartoretti suggestion hopefully its help. Coz it works for me


I have had the same problem a few months ago (after a watchOS update), and again last week when upgrading to watchOS 10. In both cases, I solved it like this (see also my previous posts much above) :


  • Un-pair the watch
  • Re-pair the watch
  • Restart the iPhone
  • Restart the watch


It works, but it is a hassle : I lost the watch configuration each time and had to do it again by hand.


It is obviously a software problem, it affects many people and has lasted for a few months at least.

Aug 31, 2023 2:53 AM in response to lobsterghost1

Took the watch to apple shop, complained about it, they ran tests.

summary, excessive usage on the battery from the Bluetooth function.


I recommend users to have this issue of excessive battery drain after update 9.5.1 (like I have experienced) go to the Apple shop and ask them to run a test.


I’m sure Apple employees monitor these forums, and if Apple have a large base of users experiencing same issues, they will review how their update (9.5.1) has

caused this issue.


I’m also noticing that the battery drain is not every day, and days where I am exercising or away from my home network, i.e. on holiday, I don’t experience excessive battery drain.



Sep 2, 2023 8:54 AM in response to RitaSweete

I had to go to Apple Store and have their techs wipe it out, install the software back on AND I had to reinstall all of my apps individually. I uploaded my pics, notes and contacts to the cloud and got those back but all apps I had to do each alone. They said otherwise it would reinstall whatever the issue was back onto my phone. Now my phone is back to normal and so is my watch battery life. Before it was dropping connection/reconnecting and that was draining my watch battery… it stays connected and is back to its 2day life…

Sep 24, 2023 8:13 AM in response to jahya17

I have had the same problem a few months ago (after a watchOS update), and again last week when upgrading to watchOS 10. In both cases, I solved it like this (see also my previous posts much above) :


  • Un-pair the watch
  • Re-pair the watch
  • Restart the iPhone
  • Restart the watch


It works, but it is a hassle : I lost the watch configuration each time and had to do it again by hand.


It is obviously a software problem, it affects many people and has lasted for a few months at least. What is Apple doing ?

Oct 6, 2023 8:24 AM in response to Presgurl

I have found the battery isn’t draining as fast when I turned off the always on feature, which is used if you continuously want the watch to display the time even when your not looking at it.


To turn this feature off which is a default feature go to settings > Display & Brightness then scroll down to Always On and move the slider toggle to off.

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Apple Watch battery drain after Update

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