How long will my iPad hold a charge
How long does a iPad stay charged
iPad, iPadOS 16
Question marked as
There are many variables that determine how ling your iPad battery can “hold a charge”.
All rechargeable batteries, including Li-ion batteries used in iPad, lose overall capacity over their useable lifespan. For every full recharge, a tiny amount of overall battery capacity is lost. This capacity loss is cumulative - and eventually a rechargeable battery will not retain sufficient charge for the host device to be useable without an external power connection. Apple quote their iPad batteries as retaining 80% of their initial capacity after 1000 full charge cycles - one full cycle being any combination of charging that totals to 100% (e.g., 50 + 20 + 20 + 10 = 100% = 1 full charge cycle).
For a healthy iPad that was fully charged and then fully shut-down - the iPad can be reasonably expected to maintain some level of battery charge for many months. The battery will naturally self-discharge over time - in addition to which a very small amount of battery will be used by the iPad, to maintain its internal clock, even when fully shut-down.
By contrast, an iPad that is being actively used throughout the day will obviously deplete its battery while being used. Apple generally quote battery life as being “up to” ten hours, although this will be heavily influenced by many factors - such as CPU load, screen brightness, temperature, background tasks, the network connection etc. As a rough guide, you might expect to see 8-15% battery depletion for each hour that the iPad is being actively used.
An iPad that is inactive/sleeping will continue to run background tasks - such as periodically retrieving email from mail server, performing automatic iCloud backups, re-indexing etc. While battery usage and background tasks will vary due to user settings, as a rough guide you can expect to see ~10% battery depletion per day. As such, an iPad that is sleeping (unused) may fully deplete a full battery charge in a week to ten days - potentially much sooner if the battery is old.
Many users that actively use their iPad will need to recharge their iPad daily - many charging their iPad overnight so that it is ready with a full charge for the following day. Other users may infrequently use their iPad - and may only recharge every few days, or when needed.
Apple offer this advice for maximising performance and maintaining your iPad battery: