iPhone 6 Motion Calibration Always Using Location Services

Afyer one day using my phone, now has the same issue. It didn't work.

I have some info that may help. I went into the health app and went into "steps" + "walking running distance" + "flights climbed" individually. Once in each one, you go to "show all data" and I saw A LOT of info, every minute saying I have been moving a couple steps, even though I have been sitting in a class room for two hours. I also noticed it did not show any info for the 30 minute drive over here. So basically, anytime I am sitting still, this motion calibration is falsely adding a couple steps every minute to my data. I went ahead and and hit "EDIT" for each of those three catogories and then deleted all. All three screens now show "no data".

All i can say for sure is that the motion calibration GPS icon in the corner, must be related to this logging of me moving 2 or 3 steps every minute, even though I am sitting in class.

I am going to keep an eye on it the next hour and see if it still thinks i am moving around.

Ok so after I deleted that data, the GPS kept turning on again for motion calibration (i disabled the frequent location option to help troubleshoot). This time though it was not logging me as moving even though I am sitting me at a desk.

I went on a break to buy a drink from vending, it logged 332 steps correctly. I am now sitting back at my desk and it does not seem to be logging anymore movement, last movement was 5 minutes ago when I got back. So apparently it is logging me moving correctly.

Only thing is, the GPS icon is staying lit most of the time, like it is waiting for me to move. Maybe if I don't fidget around or type on my laptop, it won't shake the phone and it will stop looking for movement on the GPS. I think for some reason when it senses movement (normal sensors), it then checks to see if the GPS is showing walking or running.

ok so i tried putting the phone someone isolated where nothing would vibrate it, and I send it some emails so the screen would light up without touching it.

the gps icon stayed lit the whole time. so far the only way i have been able to get the GPS icon off, is to turn off "motion calibration" completely.

What I suggested in my last post didn't end up working. I tried a few more things and I have something else to try that seems promising. I turned off background app refresh for the Twitter app. Almost immediately after doing that motion calibration stopped using location services. I'll post back in a couple of days to confirm if this worked long term or not.

I had this problem, too, and posted a few months ago about my experience.

Since I've seen some renewed activity on this thread, I thought I'd give an update.

I experienced the same issues regarding the location services icon being constantly on. This is definitely not how location services are supposed to work. But more importantly, the result of location always being accessed is that there is a big drain on battery. I would go to sleep at night with my phone at 90%, and wake up to it at 75%. At most, a properly functioning phone should lose maybe 5% overnight.

After running a diagnostics test (per an Apple rep who sent me a link to run the test), it seemed there was a software problem on my phone. So I reluctantly did a complete erase and install, and set the phone up as new.

Unfortunately, this did not solve the problem. The only solution I could find was to turn off Motion Calibration, but that limits the functionality of the phone, so that's not really a solution.

In the end, I took my phone into the Apple store and exchanged it.

Sure enough, my new unit works great, and the location services icon only comes on when it's supposed to (i.e., when it's being asked for location via an app), and turns off fairly quickly afterwards.

Long story short -- it seems to be an actual hardware issue, at least it was for me. Exchanging the unit fixed it.

Matthew Palm wrote:

I experienced the same issues regarding the location services icon being constantly on. This is definitely not how location services are supposed to work. But more importantly, the result of location always being accessed is that there is a big drain on battery. I would go to sleep at night with my phone at 90%, and wake up to it at 75%. At most, a properly functioning phone should lose maybe 5% overnight.

Please cite a reference for those numbers, as they are totally bogus. Every phone will drain differently based on the apps installed, how many emails you get overnight, how many apps are running in background, what your cellular signal strength is, and probably a dozen other factors. There is no "should." There are over 500 million iPhones in use, and it's likely that there are 500 million different battery drain rates overnight.

For reference, my iPhone 6 is using location services 24 hours a day, or at least every time I wake it the arrow is on. My phone uses about 40% of its battery life in 12 hours of heavy use during the day. I have 240 apps installed, and use at least a dozen on a regular basis. Location Services does not use a lot of energy. Apps use energy.

I admit I have no idea what it uses overnight, as I charge it overnight, every night, so I have 100% in the morning. And I've been doing that for the almost 7 years I've had iPhones, without any ill effects.

Hi Lawrence:

Thanks for the note. To clarify, I don't use push notifications for anything but 2 apps that are set to receive alerts. This was how my other iPhones were set up, too. My iPhone 4, iPhone 5, and now my current iPhone 6 all get great battery life during standby. Yes, battery life during use always varies widely, but during standby it should be pretty consistent if push is off. For me, as well as friends I've asked, I would generally lose about 5% of battery overnight. Sometimes 10%, but sometimes zero. When I got my first iphone 6, and the location services icon was running constantly, battery life during standby dropped off a huge amount. Plus, seeing that icon constantly on did not seem right to me - and Apple confirmed that that shouldn't really be the case.

After trying everything thing I described above, the location services icon remained persistent. So finally, I replaced the unit, and now, location services is behaving as it should and my battery life is back to being great.

I share this because there might be people out there who also have something wrong with their hardware, and if it's still under warranty, why not try replacing it?

For the record, this shows me how terrific Apple is. Given that they churned out 74 million phones, of course some will always be less than perfect. The way Apple deals with customers to do all they can to make them happy and get them units that work as intended is why I keep coming back for their great products.

Hello everyone!

Same problem here, solved doing as follows:

1. Reset Network Settings

2. Reset Location & Privacy

3. Shutdown & Start the iPhone

All these have been done at about 11:00 AM today, now it's almost 10:00 PM and all is good, including battery consumption - I mean, when I restated iPhone I had about 87% battery. Wi-fi connection on all the time, few phone calls, applications allowed to synch in the background, and by 05:30 PM I still had 81% battery. I mention 05:30 PM because starting then I intensively used the phone (screen on, Internet, some pictures, Internet browsing, a few kilometers GPS navigation etc. Now battery is at 45%)

Nevermind... The problem reappeared!... 😟

iOS 8.2 seems solved problem. Just turn off Health tracking.

Okay, I live way out in the sticks, so I have satellite internet. My data is severely limited as far as the amount I have to use each month (15GB). I started noticing a major data suck going on since picking up my new iPhone 6+. A few days before getting it I decided to go through all of my settings and apps and get everything ready for a backup before grabbing the 6+. One thing I did was disable the frequent locations setting. I do not want apple to see where I frequent, for any reason. A few days ago I started going through my settings again and noticed the option to turn on the location services icon for system services and ran into the same problem all of you are having. This has to be my data suck. After reading through the entire forum and seeing that certain things worked for a bit but then the problem would return, I decided to try just turning everything back on that I had off, including frequent location tracking. Guess what. That fixed the problem. The icon almost immediately dissapeared And hasn't returned. It seems as if the phone is reacting to certain location services being deactivated. I think the iPhone is now operating on an all or nothing type of system, whereas it seems to need one setting activated to properly run the next. I could be wrong.

iOS 8.2 does not solve the problem "calibration motion and distance" always active.

Disable "Physical activity detection" does not help.

After several phone calls to AppleCare and two talks at the Genius Bar, I came to the conclusion that this is a bug in iOS. List my recent experiences:

iOS 8.1.3 restored in DFU mode as "new iPhone."

-No Recovery backup.

-iCloud active.

-Upgrade applications in the background off.

-Weather with permits localization disabled.

-No Third-party application installed.

During the first cycle of the battery (100% to <15%) the localization had a normal behavior, is switched on and off depending on the use. Never been active continuously for more than a few minutes. After connecting the phone to the charger, after a while, already during the charge localization has remained fixed.

With iOS 8.2

iOS 8.2 restored in DFU mode as "new iPhone."

-No Recovery backup.

-iCloud active.

- "Physical activity detection" disabled.

This time the localization had a normal behavior for 2 cycles of the battery (the first from 100% to <20% and the second from 100% to <15%). When I started the third cycle (it was in charge the whole night in a "do not disturb") the bug has come back.

-The Bug does not appear during the first cycle of the battery after a restore.

-disable And reactivate "localization" temporarily solves the bug.

-disable And reactivate "update applications in the background" temporarily solves the bug.

-Restore Privacy settings and location temporarily fixes the bug.

-disable All system services except "calibration movement and distance" fixes the bug, but it is not a solution (the bug only occurs if "calibration movement and distance" and "common positions" are enabled).

-The Bug does not depend on third-party applications.

-The Bug does not depends on Weather or Health.

-disable "Update applications in the background" does not fix the bug (but seems somehow connected).

-The Sensor calibration procedure (leave the device connected to the charger 90 min in a horizontal position in do not disturb active) does not fix the bug.

I will hold off "calibration motion and distance" until Apple will fix the bug.

I'm sorry for my bad english, i used google translate.

Benares

Yes, that's exactly what I've done and those are the same resultes I've got. I always said that when you restore (no matter how: with iTunes backup, no backup, iCloud backup, etc) the problem seems solved during the first battery cycle, it comes back on the second one. With 8.2 MC works normally during the first 2 cycles, after that it is always on. And yes, I did think it was a bug but now I'm almost sure it's the way the iPhone calibrates MC.

iPhone 6, 16 gb

iOS 8.2, restored as new iPhone

No backup

No apps refreshing in background

No apps using location

iphone 6 and 6+ works in this way only. 4s didn't do it and 5s i almost sure neither.

How much time needs the iphone 6 to calibrate motion?