Apple Watch battery draining fast

It just started today for me too! The draining is so rapid, I charged it 3x today. This is ridiculous and I just got it a few months ago. Open to suggestions on how to remedy this problem. The preparation for update is also taking forever

I hope this helps someone and isn’t just a coincidence.

Yesterday, I woke up and my watch was dead which was odd since I had pulled it off the charger after 11pm the night before. Normally, it had almost 90% charge left at this time.

I charged the watch back to 100% first, and then saw that there was an update and thought that would fix the battery drain. So, I tried to install it and it got stuck at the “preparing” step and I found myself in this thread looking for a solution.

I tried a factory reset and re-pair and that didn’t work.

I then found the recommendation to delete the download and try again. I also restarted my watch and phone each time I deleted the download. I did that 3 or 4 times and it kept getting stuck at the same point during installation of the download. I had hoped that somehow the battery drain problem would fix itself, but it didn’t. I had other stuff to do so I deleted the download and went about my day.

I tried again, about 6 hours (and over 50% of my battery) later and the update stalled again (after I charged it above 50%). At this point, I decided to turn off automatic updates for my watch (which I’ve always kept on) and then delete the download one last time and restart my watch again.

Since that time, the battery drain has STOPPED.

I don’t have the latest update, but at least my watch will make it through the day now.

My conclusion (and it may be wrong but hopefully not) is that some combination of this particular update plus automatic downloads is the culprit to the battery drain.

Turn off automatic updates, delete the download, restart, and cross your fingers.

Good luck!

Same here: battery draining as like the rest of us. Read that update might help so looked to see if there was one waiting. 10.4 was available. Update was fairly quick. Now running for over an hour and still at 100%. Fingers crossed!

Apple Watch SE (2nd generation) 44mm case (Model: A2723)

Same here. I have reset updated (10.4 update) twice and it is still burning the battery so fast. I lose 10% within 10 mins without doing any activity. Not sure what else can be done or do we wait for a new update.

For all those who are facing battery drain issue post 10.4 update on their apple watch I have a fix for you

got to settings > Go to passcodes > Turn of wrist detection it will get your watch back to its normal battery function.

I don't know how this thing started happening all of a sudden do give it a try

I have the 10.4 update and it’s not helping at all. My battery drains so fast. It was at 90% and I checked one message and then it was at 88%. I’ll try to unpair and repair since that seems to help others. But I can’t not delete the update. It’s not showing up.

I’m having the same issue on my series 9. I’ve been on 10.4 and since April 11, my watch battery has been continuously draining at minimally 1% every 2-3 min. I just turned off automatic updates and background app refresh, restarted, and it’s still plummeting at the same rate. I’m writing this after charging my battery to 100% before sleeping with my watch in sleep mode and having no other activity on my watch. There’s a ghost in the machine for sure…

Hi,

So I had the same issue since the last 5 days. Turns out it was an update pending. The problem was that the update was not installing and was stuck at preparing which was probably what was draining the battery. I tried everything from restarts to deleting update file from storage and re installing it, but it was still stuck on preparing. Finally I left the watch on charge for 2 days and wore it sparingly. I also unselected the auto update option so the watch being connected to Wi-Fi and charger ended up completing the ‘preparing update’ mode. Post this it showed install update mode. So now my watch battery is back to normal and running the usual 18-24 hours of my usual wear time. So again let it move from preparing to install now mode and that should fix the problem hopefully.

Will update you all on battery life after the 10.4 update is installed and running on my watch. Hope this helps

What worked for me:

Unsuccessful Attempt 1: Turned off automatic updates and background app refresh and force restarted (simultaneously holding side button and dial until apple logo appeared)

The battery drained to near zero and I recharged to 100%

Successful Attempt 2: I immediately force restarted after taking the watch off the charger at 100% and it has been rock solid for 4.5 hours right now - only 10% battery drain with light usage which has been typical. I did not unpair or do anything at all with my iPhone 14 Pro. Just those 2 attempts. Hope this helps you!

My ultra 2 since the update it finally successfully completed 2 days ago does in hours. Usually last me 3-4 days. Whatever happened in that update screwed us all. Also to this day I don’t understand why it has such a hard time updating. I’ll get failed to update prompts for weeks sometime. Other times I won’t even know it’s updated. So inconsistent.

Erase? Like reset the watch to factory settings? I’ll just put it away until apple issues a fix. I almost exclusively use it solely as a timer for exercise sets anyway lol. The Ultra 2 is my first Apple Watch and I’m as impressed by it as I expected to be with the original however long ago that was. I had hoped I’d be able to leave my phone at home situationally but the functionality isn’t comparable and it has fallen well short of that plan. Sad really.

This is happening to me and my husband as well with both of our watches. We fully charge them at night and within 4 hours yesterday I was down to 70% battery and by 8-10 hours I was down to just 20%. The watch fully died by dinner time, just 12-13 hours into usage and I was sitting at a desk all day, not logging anything on my watch like workouts or anything. I’ve disabled most background processes, I’m constantly connected to WiFi, and I don’t have the screen permanently turned on. This seemed to just start happening in the last week or two, it’s super frustrating. We can’t even finish a simple walk or hike in town without them dying on us part way through our workout. What’s the deal?

It seems that the problem is that the update to watchOS 10.4 literally eats up the watch's battery.

Once updated, the battery drain returns to normal.

Be careful! because updating to watchOS 10.4 is also tedious and gives problems (it freezes and you have to delete the update and update again after resetting iPhone and Apple watch).

Hope this help

Best wishes to all

I had a series 8 Apple Watch for the past couple of years and its battery would last day and night for a few days. I upgraded to the series 9 just around two months ago. Suddenly, in the last several weeks, I’ve noticed that I have to charge it every day. I have not increased usage and have even attempted leaving it on Theatre mode, so the screen does not light up at all unless you tap it. Nothing has helped. I haven’t seen any comment that dates a solution yet.

Same exact thing happened to me starting April 11th. Same watch with the same settings but if I look at the battery app you can see the steep downward line showing the draining at a very fast rate. I even went to the Apple Store and they did some diagnostics and said there was nothing wrong with the battery itself. She suggested turning off background app refresh and turning the watch off and back on. I had already done the latter, and (reluctantly) did the former (i.e., turned off background app refresh) since I had never had a battery problem even with background app refresh turned on. Anyway, none of this has helped.

I should mention that the battery drain started happening before the most recent Watch OS update. I've since installed the new update and it has not changed anything for the better (although it is not necessarily any worse).

Anyone know of the reason for the problem and the fix?