IOS 9.2 Rapid Battery Drain Issue

JAQRIPP wrote:

no prob. Just make sure you back your phone up before you do it. Happy new year

If you make a backup of a phone on 9.2 you will not be able to restore it to a phone running 9.1. And there is no safe way to downgrade to 9.1 at this point, as Apple has stopped signing 9.1; any way that is successful will require installing a hacked version, which will open up your phone to other vulnerabilities.

Same issue here. I had the 6 64gb. Upgraded to the 6s 64 gb on 12/27. When Restoring a backup to the new 6s, it said I had to upgrade to 9.2 first. I did. Battery life is horrendous. 100% when going to sleep. 40% when alarm goes off in the morning. All apps closed. When trying to go back to 9.1, it says the phone is not eligible for that iOS. Unbelievable. I've done the reset. Forgot to mention, this is the 2nd 6s. Took the first one back on 12/29 for the battery issue and they just swapped out the phone. My daughter got the 6s 128gb on the same date and has no issues with battery life.

Happy New Year all!

Waterbound.....so true. I'm only familiar with the battery drain issue and the logic board failure. I run virtually no apps and I close them all down frequently, no bluetooth unless I want it. Battery drain on my iPhone 5 after last update. Just read an article on the iPhone 4 and a lawsuit in which the claim is that an update pretty much took this phone out. The claim is "planned obsolescence". I could see that. But I also think that as technology moves forward things happen that definitely affect older product. Not updating my iPhone 5 again and not moving to El Capitan for awhile either. Can't afford to replace devices and the Apple Store if not helpful.

smoledman wrote:

As long as you save the .ipsw file locally it doesn't matter what Apple does. You can restore to iOS 9.1 forever. That's what I'm going to do in case they screw it up again with the next update. I've already got my local full iPhone backup on iTunes and I will revert rather than endure horrific battery life.

Actually no you cannot restore it forever. You still need to contact the apple server to have the software signed and even though you have it on your computer it will not restore once apple stops signing for older software.

Well if that's the case, than I have to hold off updating to iOS 9.2.X or iOS 9.3 for as long as possible. It's absolutely ridiculous that Apple doesn't even allow you to downgrade indefinitely within a major revision(all iOS 9.X versions) for the year. I understand not allowing to downgrade to iOS 8/7/6, but iOS 9 variants? Apple, this is anti-consumer.

There are several other threads from users of 9.1 who complained about terrible battery life, and most reported that 9.2 fixed the problem. So maybe it isn't the version that's at issue.

To downgrade to 9.1 you have to completely wipe the phone, then restore it clean. I'll bet that if you did the same steps, but reinstalled 9.2, it would also fix the problem.

The fact that my phone was fine on iOS 9.1 and upgrading to 9.2 is what caused my rapid battery drain. Now maybe updating to iOS 9.2 will be safe now, but I genuinely am worried that it won't work. Also if 9.2 is no good again and Apple won't authenticate my iOS 9.1 firmware again if I try a rollback, than I'm stuck with a phone that's rapidly draining and virtually non-functional. Apple seriously needs to acknowledge this.

The process of upgrading sometimes causes battery issues. This has been true for every version from 1.1 8 years ago on. I can find posts exactly like yours, with only the version number different, going back 8 years. For example, as I said, there are a number of similar posts referring to 9.1. 9.2 is fine; battery life is normal on all 4 of my iOS devices on 9.2. Something (probably an app) got corrupted by the update process. Normal troubleshooting steps will find it. Waiting for Apple to do something may be satisfying, but it won't fix the problem.

It's possible some corruption happened in the updating process. I have 2 other devices on iOS 9.2(ipad Mini & iPod Touch) with no battery drain or other issues. I do have an Android phone, so if updating my iPhone 6S again cause the battery drain issue I will switch the SIM card over and deal with the issue w/o it affecting my life on a daily basis.

When going in to see the details of the battery usage, it showed the App Store and Facebook were big culprits. They both showed background activity. I changed the App Store app to not automatically download music purchased (only one I had set to automatically download), and uninstalled/reinstalled Facebook.

I am now still at 79% battery after 1 hr, 43 min Usage and 5 hr, 46 min Standby.

Mind you, most everything on the phone is now set to off, but in that same time before I did those 2 things, the battery would have been completed depleted.

Maybe this could be a fix for others as well!

Now you're on to something. Facebook's last couple of updates have been real battery hogs. Facebook is aware of it, and promises a fix RSN (Real Soon Now).

Thanks. Your posts made me keep going over apps to see if I can find it. Hope it stays "fixed". Fingers crossed!

Happy New Year all!

Unfortuntely, my main battery drain shows as Safari. I've gone in and changed everything, but still Safari is sucking the battery life.

My issue seems to be slightly different. My fully charged iPhone 6 running iOS 9.2 charges to 100%, but when the battery gets down to 82-85%, it shuts off and indicates a totally drained battery. If I plug it in, it starts recharging at the charge level (82-85%) at which it died.
I have successfully performed a "Restore To Factory Default" and "Restore From Backup" (un-encrypted), but the problem persists.
This is NOT a rapid battery drain problem. From 100% to 85% , the battery life seems normal and then it just dies.

Launch Safari. Tap the boxes in the lower right to show all of your open pages. Close all of them by clicking the "x" in the upper left corner of each page.

Then press HOME. Wait a second, then double-press HOME and swipe up the Safari icon to close it.

Next go to Settings/Safari, scroll down and tap Clear history and website data.

This should stop the drain caused by Safari, which is probably a page that is auto-updating.