Experiencing significant battery drain on Apple Watch post update

FIXED! OK Apple Watchers! I have been right there with you experiencing staggering battery drain on my Ultra 2 since the Watch OS 10.4 update. My wife has the exact same watch with very similar setup. We updated both watches at the same time. Her watch did not experience any battery drain issues. Who knows why some of us took such a huge performance hit after this update while others did not? Considering the vast resources at their disposal, Apple can and should do a better job than this of scrutinizing all updates before release. While community beta testing feedback is certainly valuable, if it is being relied on too heavily, Apple has got to dedicate more resources to taking ownership of every update and every issue it might introduce to us. Enough about that already! Now for the fix! A couple of posts have mentioned a hard reset fix for this issue. I am extremely relieved to report that it works if done correctly!! First off, make certain that you know how to perform a hard reset on your watch and your iPhone. You have to do both! (Normal power off and on have no effect on this issue. Nor did any number of battery consumption reducing settings changes)

On the Ultra 2 watch a hard reset requires pressing the digital crown and the side button simultaneously and holding until the Apple logo appears. On newer iPhones, quickly press and release volume up then volume down and then press and hold the side button until Apple logo appears. I hard reset the phone first and then hard reset the watch while the phone was starting up. I wanted the phone to be up and running when the watch finished resetting and started searching for the phone. I hard reset both twice back to back. Maybe once would have done it but I am just reporting exactly what I did to get my watch back. I cannot express how frustrated and angry I have been (not without getting my post removed that is) about the battery performance loss on my Apple Watch Ultra 2 after updating to Watch OS 10.4 The watch is the most prized gadget I have ever owned and ever since I purchased it I have been overwhelmed by the technology and innovation that went into it’s design. That is why the hit I took after the update pushed me over the edge. That and the fact that I know Apple can do better. There needs to be a reckoning, perhaps a complete overhaul of the entire update development process. Please Apple: Don’t do this to me again.

I force restarted both my Watch 5 AND iPhone, and it has been working well. Back to charging every 24-36 hours.

Same problem. Resolved by Genius Bar personnel by having both watch 7 and iphoneXR hard reset.

Hi,

i have the same. I also noticed that watch keeps rebooting.

Withing the Watch app, Generals > Diagnostic logs I always see a kernel panic.

Hopefully 10.4.1 is coming soon as my Ultra 2 is barely usable.

Mine is a Series 6 GPS and I’ve got the same problem. Apple is HORRIBLE about admitting mistakes, but this software version (10.4) should not have been released, it is flawed.

I’ve had these issues several times before and luckily, they usually focus on fixing the battery drain issue in the next couple minor update versions.

Prior to the 10.4 update, I was getting about a day and a half to two days of battery life. Now I get between half a day and maybe 3/4 of a day before it shuts off from 100%.

Watch 9, OS 10.4

WiFi only, phone always nearby.

Battery health 99%.

Used to last for 24 hours, now 10 hours with a fitness training of 45mins.

All non-Apple apps deleted from watch, reset performed.

Cannot we do anything about that?

I’ve also been experiencing serious battery — intermittently, but regularly — probably since the update to 10.4 (Watch 5, I believe).

I’ve done a hard reset & adjusted some settings. Next, I’m going to hard reset both iPhone & Watch (as a couple commenters mentioned).

Other users report that powering off the watch and then back on resolved the power drain issue.

M1 Mac mini, macOS 14.4.1;  Watch, series 7 GPS/cellular, watchOS 10.4; iPhone 12 Pro, iOS 17.4.1; TV 4th Gen, tvOS 17.4; HomePods, audioOS 17.4 and Airport Express w/ Airplay 2

I’m still working through this. Sometimes my battery does well. Other times it tanks.

It does well after I force close all apps on the Watch — until I did a Workout yesterday. So, I’ve closed all apps again (Heart Rate, Fitness, I believe) & if I can narrow it down further or if it’s just the Workout.

Unpairing and pairing again as recommended by the support did help (for one day so far).

Unpairing and repairing has also worked for me so far. I set it up as a new watch and two hours later still on 100%

Hard restart didn’t fix for me. Re pair and hard restart reset did fix it for me.

Exact same problem here, immediately after the 10.4 update. Prior to the update, I still had 15-20% battery life left at the end of the day after 17 hours and a workout. Since the update, I'm at 55-60% battery life by 9am, and the battery completely dies at around 6:30-7pm (13 hours of use). It's extremely frustrating. I'm reluctant to do a hard reset because last time I had to do that I lost 12 months worth of health data that I monitor very carefully for workouts and overall health.

Have issue with Watch OS 10.4 update. It is stuck on Preparing and apple watch 7 battery is draining very fast.

I restarted iphone and watch - no help

Deleted the installed 10.4 on watch - no help as well

The same problem with new Apple Watch 9 😢 At the end of a day (23:00) it has 0% battery. Battery capacity is 100%.