Battery status indicator for wireless keyboard - El Capitan

I am on Mac (21.5-inch, Late 2015), less than 2 months old.

That's odd. I tried disconnect and reconnect, the status box is still missing!

Apologies for the big text, I am blind and need to enlarge to read clearly. Thank you.

Hey folks,

I have the same problem with the missing magic keyboard battery indicator on my late, iMac, 27 inch, 2015, model. I swear I used to had the magic keyboard battery indicator until one day I left the USB lighting connector connected for an extended period of time, the magic keyboard battery indicator disappeared itself?

Recently, I have updated to OSX to 10.11.3, same as before, still no magic keyboard indicator. I still only have the battery indicator for my magic mouse 2. I can get the battery indicator info from the bluetooth system preferences for both peripherals but what escapes me is to why the magic mouse 2 can have the battery indicator and not the magic keyboard. See screenshot below:

Any ideas to get the magic keyboard indicator back again?

On Jan. 23rd I received this reply from AppleCare Support:

Engineering is still investigating the issue you are experiencing with not being able to see the Keyboard Battery level in system preferences and I will reach out to you with any updates they may have.

It's been two weeks since I contacted them about this issue.

Typical for Apple - you pay good money for an AppleCare Plan expecting prompt service, then they take weeks to respond.

Several times I've never heard from Engineering after submitting an issue, and was never able to get additional email replies from the reps either - the issues were just ignored/forgotten.

Today I received an email from another rep about a different issue.

After talking to her on the phone and sending several screenshots in multiple emails, she now says:

we do not troubleshoot through email, as apple policy doesn’t allow for it at this point in time...Im sorry but you will have to call the mainline if you would like more done at this time.

On 12/31/15 she said:

I’m going to send this one to the engineers to have a look at it and see if we can get a final fix.

On 1/13/16 she said:

i got the response from them last night just before i was leaving for the night.

But they are investigating the issues with the podcast setting not working as intended

Again with the "engineers," and a month later I still haven't received a solution.

I think engineers is Applespeak for TRASH CAN!

It should be called an AppleDoesn'tCare Plan! 😠

So it seems likely that the "engineers" aren't looking into this keyboard power level issue at all - we're on our own.

By clicking onto Bluetooth icon top right of desktop screen with drop-down menu, worked for me to find out both the mouse 2 and keyboard 2 power levels.

Additional way for power level on the mouse 2 (only) was open 'System Preferences' click onto mouse icon, at base of window displayed the power level status.

Thank you for lighting my darkness...LOL

However still no keyboard battery indicator in system preferences, keyboard icon?

I too cannot get the keyboard power level using 'System Preferences' on my December 2015 iMac 21.5"

As I last stated, go to 'Bluetooth' icon at top right of your screen, left click and I can see the the keyboard and mouse listed.

By scrolling down and highlighting either the keyboard or mouse reveals the power levels.

My 21.5 iMac late 2015 came with OS X 10.11 and the same thing is there with it so it's not an "upgrade" lol

I have two iMacs in my home running El Capitan. One is Late 2009 and the other is late 2015. The battery level in the bluetooth menu for the older iMac's older keyboard and mouse always shows 100% while the newer iMac shows a value other less than 100%. Me thinks, El Capitan expects everyone to have the latest hardware and has not been programed to handle the older hardware. Pre-El Capitan, the OS would alert you when the battery level was low. I do not recall seeing such a message with El Capitan.

Me thinks that's an incorrect assumption.

Some of the posts stated they are having this issue on 2015 models.

Mine is 2014 Mac mini, but it was manufactured in Dec. 2015, the same month it was shipped to me from Apple.

It arrived with El Capitan installed.

I have just purchased a magic keyboard and according to the instructions, the battery status can checked through System Preferences by clicking on keyboard and the battery balance of the keyboard is shown on the lower left corner. I am using El Capitan and there is no such indicator. The only way I can check is to to follow your method. Why can't April update its instructions at least via its web-site?

April (Apple) is too busy rolling in their money to care.

If they cared at all about problems people were having with their products, they'd have mods here monitoring discussions for issues like this one.

It is apparently an incorrect assumption as I have a mid-2010 21.5 inch i-Mac running 10.11.3 and I see the wireless mouse battery and keyboard level indicated in both system prefs and on the blue tooth monitor in the menu bar. The mystery continues...