Iphone 5 Shutting down, Cold Weather? or defective battery

I've had my iPhone 5 (Verizon) do this to me quite a bit with the battery ranging from a low of 30% to a high of 80% when it happens. If you bring it indoors and let it warm up, it will come back on with the battery at 3-5% below where it was when it froze. A couple of thoughts:

1. Will the Apple Genius replace it if you take it in? I presume that there must be some specs that they can pull out of the battery and this immediate shutoff doesn't seem like part of standard operating procedure.

2. I have no idea how a restore would/could fix this problem as it feels to me like a chemical/physical thing with this new design (and ideally only some batches of the battery) but if anyone has any different experience, please post it here!

Thx,

AR

I'm struck by how in your (and antrod's) post, all I see are fairly low battery percent numbers.

Have you tried simply plugging your iPhone in overnight and letting it charge to at or near 100%?

Environmental specs for iPhone 5:

• Operating ambient temperature: 32° to 95° F (0° to 35° C)
• Nonoperating temperature: −4° to 113° F (−20° to 45° C)
• Relative humidity: 5% to 95% noncondensing
• Maximum operating altitude: 10,000 feet (3000 m)

Lithium ion batteries can drain very rapidly in extremely cold conditions. When outside in sub-freezing weather, try to keep the phone in an inside pocket, close to your body. Don't leave it in the car for any length of time. Once the phone is warmed up again, it should function normally and there should be no lasting damage. If your phone continues to behave that way under normal operating conditions, take it to the Apple Store.

Also, note that no matter what the operating range, it was the same on the 4s, 4, and 3GS and in all of those cases it wouldn't shut off in the cold.

And what about the idea that a full reset of ios would fix this? I am doubtful and it is a bit of a pain.

I read your whole case and it is IDENTICLE to mine. I restored it and I put back all my applications and such from iCloud (the apple store said that that would work as setting it up as a new product). When I took it to the "genius" bar they diagnosed it over the network to find out that my applications as well as "springboard" are crashing multiple times. The genius said that springboard crashing is the cause of it. The said all of the hardware on the phone ( battery and such) was working perfectly. I'm yet to go back after restore. Still no fix for me, any luck for you? I am still covered under warranty so any guesses on what I should try and ill let you know if it works so you know whether you should pay the money to get it done or not? Hope this information helps a little.

Similar experience in cold weather. I think it is normal. I think iPhone 5 actually handles it a bit better. My 4 used to suddenly lose power in the cold and would require charging before it could be powered on, even once temperatures rose.

Today my iPhone 5 had 52% batteries. It was in an inside pocket, but I went higher up a mountain today and the temperature dropped to -15. Even with the phone in an inside pocket, it shut down. I have seen it do this while watching the screen - it does not go down to low battery and then power off, it is a straight shut down. It won't respond in this state even to show the 'charge' screen.

But now in a warm restaurant, after a few minutes warming up, it's powered on and is right back to 52% where it started. Assuming you are below 0°, I think not a fault, just the way the batteries respond to cold. If it happens when it's not that cold, perhaps there is another issue.

Mine too - only it doesn't have to be below freezing. Just cool is enough to trip it into shutdown sometimes... Will try warraty question - anyone have any luck with that?

I went to apple with this issue it showed no battery problems I told them and told them I restored the software multiple times and insisted on exchanging the phone for a new one because I was sick of it happening again and they had no problem with it and have me a new iphone no problem, this issue is unsolvable

Is there a solution to this? I live where it is cold all the time in the winter and many, many, many, people bought Iphone 5s here. It is pretty useless to have this phone in an emergency ... i.e. if my daughter gets stuck outside somewhere in the cold and cannot call me. Can Apple advise us on this?

Mariefromnt wrote:

Is there a solution to this? I live where it is cold all the time in the winter and many, many, many, people bought Iphone 5s here.

This is not unique to iPhones. It's a function of the chemistry of a lithium ion battery which is what all modern cell phones have. As noted above, keep the phone in an inside pocket, close to your body. Mind you, it would have to be extremely cold before this should be a major problem.

And, this is a user-to-user technical support forum. Apple doesn't generally participate here.

The solution is to take advantage of the fact that virtually every coat and parka designed for cold weather in the past 15 years has an inside pocket or two or three just the right size for a cell phone. Keep the phone in the pocket next to your body and it will be close body temperature, and the outside temperature won't be an issue.

...or for Apple to acknowledge that this shouldn't happen when the phone has 70% charge and it's 10°c?

I think I know which one I prefer.

grahamm_6t9 wrote:

...or for Apple to acknowledge that this shouldn't happen when the phone has 70% charge and it's 10°c?

Apple, magical though they might seem to be, cannot rewrite the laws of physics and electro chemistry.

However, what you're describing sounds like it may be something completely different. Perhaps it's time to take your iPhone into the Genius Bar at your local Apple Store.