Q: iPhone 4s Battery Life?

Ok, I did some more digging around, this msg may only be interesting for the technically inclined persons/developers among us:

I looked at the stats of my wlan router and noticed that the 4S (during standby) ist opening and closing a wlan connection multiple times per minute whereas my 3GS (running iOS 5) is not.

I got curious about what is going on an listened to the traffic of both phones, the 4S with the battery drain problem and the 3GS running iOS 5 without, using wireshark.

The IP traffic is purely MDNS but very differnt between the two of them, especially after a time after switch on to settle in for both the 3GS communication is 18 packets while the 4S at the same time exchanged 180 packets.

For the specialists here a wireshark-log (starting bit) is attached. After this settling in period the 4S repeats the cyles endlessly with doing a IGMP "V3 Membership Report / Join group" roughly every 70 seconds (and then twice 2.5 seconds apart) - the 3GS does not do this, it does only the MDNS query/response every 180 seconds.

I suspect something similar going on for mobile data and possibly this behaviour is only exhibited in combination with specific WLAN / carrier configurations.

Wireshark protocols:

3GS:

No.     Time        Source                Destination           Protocol Length Info

  19164 1063.592343 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.22            IGMP     60     V3 Membership Report / Join group 224.0.0.251 for any sources

  19167 1063.768886 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local, "QU" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local, "QU" question

  19170 1063.952198 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local, "QM" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local, "QM" question

  19175 1064.298182 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local, "QM" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local, "QM" question

  19177 1064.486946 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::226:8ff:xxxx:xxxx A, cache flush 192.168.1.20

  19180 1065.195762 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.22            IGMP     60     V3 Membership Report / Join group 224.0.0.251 for any sources

  19181 1065.551011 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::226:8ff:xxxx:xxxx A, cache flush 192.168.1.20

  19185 1067.564274 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::226:8ff:xxxx:xxxx A, cache flush 192.168.1.20

  19205 1071.596482 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::226:8ff:xxxx:xxxx A, cache flush 192.168.1.20

  19232 1079.604628 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::226:8ff:xxxx:xxxx A, cache flush 192.168.1.20

  19280 1095.643152 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::226:8ff:xxxx:xxxx A, cache flush 192.168.1.20

  21495 1127.682173 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.251           MDNS     306    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone-2.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::226:8ff:xxxx:xxxx A, cache flush 192.168.1.20

  21533 1133.305208 192.168.1.20          224.0.0.22            IGMP     60     V3 Membership Report / Join group 224.0.0.251 for any sources

4S:

No.     Time        Source                Destination           Protocol Length Info

  39597 1395.473623 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.22            IGMP     60     V3 Membership Report / Join group 224.0.0.251 for any sources

  39598 1395.687011 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     130    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QU" question

  39600 1395.956060 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     130    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question

  39603 1396.183904 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     130    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question

  39608 1396.434333 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     198    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42

  39670 1397.502097 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     198    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42

  39673 1398.523583 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.22            IGMP     60     V3 Membership Report / Join group 224.0.0.251 for any sources

  39674 1398.990099 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QU" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QU" question

  39680 1399.247814 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question

  39682 1399.517655 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question

  39684 1399.784502 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  39686 1400.586504 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  39692 1402.571952 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  40166 1406.625673 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  42371 1414.665672 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  43796 1438.072581 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QU" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QU" question

  43800 1438.377912 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question

  43802 1438.646892 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     164    Standard query ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question ANY Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local, "QM" question

  43804 1438.915076 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  43811 1439.914208 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  43820 1441.980026 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  43856 1445.990886 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.251           MDNS     329    Standard query response PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local PTR, cache flush Jens-0815s-iPhone4S.local A, cache flush 192.168.1.42 AAAA, cache flush fe80::62c5:47ff:xxxx:xxxx

  43908 1463.318199 192.168.1.42          224.0.0.22            IGMP     60     V3 Membership Report / Join group 224.0.0.251 for any sources

Something I noticed yesterday after once again draining my iphone 4s battery level to 5% before recharging again.  When I plugged my charging cable into the phone and it began to charge the lower back portion of the case became very hot to the touch.  it was not a normal recharging warmth i'm usually accustomed to. In addition, I went to the usage statistics and observed that the usage on the iphone was increasing for each minute the phone was plugged in and charging. now maybe the usage minutes typically goes up for each minute during the charge cycle but i don't believe i've ever noticed that before.

Don't see many others mention it -- Does you 4s reach 100% charge?  Mine doesn't. I can leave it on the charger all night and still 98 or 99% in the morning. I have a few times let it completely drain and die, so should be conditioned.

Further, if i check Settings > General > Usage . My "time since last full charge" and "standby" just says  -  [dash]

Battery life is terrible, even after trying most of the suggestions here. Will try log a call with support today.

listen guys I was having terrible problems with the battery on the 4s but now works perfect. in 4-5 I only used 12% which isn't bad and I suppose is how it should work.

here is a listed things that I did.

1, I restored it as I live in the uk and noticed that it was set to California timezone.

2, I turned off the weather widget, who on earth needs it? just look out of the window.

3, I turned off Siri until I need to use it.

4, I turned the email from push notifications to manual every 15 minutes.

5, turn off apps in iCloud, their is a feature in the app store which tells you which apps you purchased so why drain your battery synching all your apps?

6, Turn auto brightness this helps big time.

7, Turn off FaceTime until you need it.

when you think about it many of these features don't need to be running all the time.

8, double tap the home button to view running apps and keep your finger on one of them until they start to wobble, you will see an x symbol on the top right hand side of each app, press that and that will end the session on each app which stops the CPU running them in the background.

one thing you have to keep in mind this is 100% not a hardware issue this is software and pure more resource issue. the 4s is running iCloud which cains the battery I turned off synching all apps and just left photos, notes in with the back up. when you click in iCloud it has all your apps on to back up which is constantly checking.

these steps will greatly improve your battery life, use these in the steps I have listed and o

enjoy your wonderful piece of kit as I am.

feedback is welcome and please let me know the results that you get.

remember this phone is running new features, iCloud, Siri and powering two antennas do you must expect it to drop the battery life also the weather app and email synching great enhance the battery.

A small correction re. my previous wireshark dump - I listend only on the LAN, so I got only the broadcast packets from my iPhones. I repeated my test in the meantime on the wifi port of my router which can luckily capture the packets for analysis with wireshark - there is a bit more going on with regard to ARP etc, but no application communication/iCloud communication.

In Addition the the above dumps differences the 4S gets a DHCP ACK every 34 seconds - which is odd...

I case any of this is news to Apple, I would happily provide the Protocols...

Looked at another log of my router: while in Standby, the iPhone 4S connects to WiFi, stays on for 21 seconds and then disconnects. After another 12 seconds it connects again, causing the new DHCP ACK. No Idea why it is continously connecting and disconnecting without transmitting any data, but it seems a good explanation for the battery drain. If it is doing the same on the mobile data interface it would explain why the battery drain increases even more if I turn that on.

Seems a Software issue after all...

I phoned apple in the UK, they are Replacing mine it dropped 20% in just over two hours on standby

but i dont think my battery is faulty... i just think the iphone 4s has a poo battery...

its annoying cause i was in a through up between this anf getting a droid.... in 4 days time im tied into my contract so i dont want to get stuck with a rubbish battery life phone.

i said the the lady to me the phone has to be a phone before its an iphone. if i cant call or text in an emergancy cause the battery has failed me its not fit for purpose

I change the settings as the poster suggerted above. I turned off:

Diagnostics & Usage

Location based iAds

Setting Time Zone

Siri / raise to speak

I unplugged the phone last night before bed and it is at 99% this morning!

I will try and narrow it down. Odd that my other phones are not affected by this.

ive turned off pretty much everthing and did that locations settings stuff tooo...

my battery still seems to be dropping far to quickly...like if i sent a text ill lose a 1% and if i click my hone button every so often it will drop a % when i do so its crazy they have ofered to replace my phone should i let them and start afresh? and see if this helps... ill apply all the batery saving techniques from the off and do three 0 - 100% charges over 3 days

On my new 4s I've tried most of the battery saving suggestions in this thread and I think its somewhat better but still not nearly what my 4 was prior to iOS5.

As an experiment last night I ran it down completely and charged to 100% about 6.30pm. Was at 95% when I went to bed about 11.30pm. At 6.30am when I woke up it was at 89%. Not terrible but not great.

But interestingly when I looked at the usage in the morning it said nearly 1 hour of usage. What is causing that? I have email on manual, iCould off, yadda yadda. I used it maybe 2 minutes to check a score before bed and that was it. Any idea what would have cause an hour of usage while I slept?

While I was intentionally running the battery down I was streaming music and got about 7.5 hours of usage before it died, which isn't bad.

So in my case at least I believe the problem is something running in the background that's killing my battery life.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Hi everyone,

I've been following this topic for quite a while now.. so now it is my turn to tell you about my problems. First of all: I'm running a set-up as new iPhone 4S 16gb on O2 Germany network.

I have done almost everything recommended on the last 42 pages (turn off Ping, turn off location services I don't need, turn off push email, dfu-restore, recalibrating the battery...).

After doing all this I almost got to 1 day of standby and 5 hours of "usage" (my actual usage was about 2-3 hours, though). This sounds quite okay at first. But when I start using my phone (nothing fancy, just browsing through the menus) I can literally watch the battery dying at a rate of 1-2% every few minutes.

This morning everything started all over again: I put my phone on my desk at work and didn't touch it. During the next two hours I recieved a few emails, 2 push notifications via Whats App and one reminder. When I looked at my iPhone the battery was down by 20% and the usage went up almost counting all the stand-by time as usage.

If anyone is interested: I've got several console-logs captured with Xcode on my Mac, a wireshark-capture of the iPhone's network traffic and whole lot of pictures showing usage/standby times at different times/battery states.

I took a look at them but I can't really figure out whats wrong besides "there are quite many tcp-messages and quite a lot of errors in the console".

I've also seen a very high traffic. On my old iPhone 3G my 300MB data plan was more than enough for a whole month, on my 4S I went through 120MB in about 7 says with roughly the same usage (I have been expecting a bit higher usage because it is a new toy and you have to try lot of things.. but 4-5 times of what I used before is simply too much.)

If this won't be fixed soon I will return my iPhone for sure. I don't want a phone I can't use because the battery will die in such a short time. And I know using location services, push, etc will eat up a lot of battery.. BUT: My iPhone 3G (yes, the old 3G I've been using the last two and a half years.. day in, day out) has got a way better battery life than my current 4S (after a day of "moderate use" my 4S has got 20% left, the 3G abouy 60%!) with the same settings when it comes to push and location services.

jensfromploen wrote:

 

In Addition the the above dumps differences the 4S gets a DHCP ACK every 34 seconds - which is odd...

 

I case any of this is news to Apple, I would happily provide the Protocols...

Jens -- My suggestion would be for you to call Apple Support and tell them your results.  I believe they are trying to gather all the info they can on this.  By the way, my phone has been running for the last 45 hours, with just 2 hours 21 minutes of usage, and the battery is at 50%.  From 9PM last night until 7AM it went from 57% to 51%, on WiFi.

i have noticed the same thing on my new iPhone 4s.... after only one and a half hours on standby.. no use at all... the phone has used like 12% of the battery... from 100% to 88%....

i have the diagnostic sending turned OFF and raise to speak tuned OFF in Siri..

i never had any problem with the battery lasting for a couple days on my iPhone 4 under normal usage.

hopefully Apple can get this issue resolved.. having to charge my phone 2 or 3 times a day is ridiculous...

Hi All,  I wanted to give an update.  I've been into the Apple store 4 times, gotten a new iPhone, reset both the old and new phone twice each, and changed just about every setting possible.  Still no luck with the battery.  

I got a phone call last night from Apple Engineering They reviewed all of my settings, had me tweak a few things, and would like me to check back in with them to see how it's going.  At least Apple knows there's a problem and attempting to fix it.

PS- my changes made only minor imporovement.  Typcially I'd lose 15-30% battery per hour... I'm down now to 3-5% per hour.  Not great, but much better.  Of course, all I do is send a few texts, so certainly not fixed.  But better.

My 4s was draining twice a day, mostly sitting in my pocket. If fully charged and turned off overnight, battery was still at 100% in the morning; that was one encouraging sign it wasn't hardware.

I turned different things off as other posts had suggested -- notifications; siri raise to speak; and so on.

What finally made the difference was deleting my exchange account, resetting the network settings, then adding the exchange account back in. Now the battery is behaving normally.

I know a range of different things have made a difference for different people. For me, my exchange account seemed to be the main problem.