5S iOS 10 Messages Background Activity causes battery to drain

I'm having the same issues as everyone above. The Apple Store swapped my iPhone 7 with a cracked screen with a new phone five days ago. The battery starting draining excessively and getting hot on Friday night. Lots of strange issues, such as the battery not charging even though it was plugged in. Message crashing when opening.

I went back to the Apple Store and they did a new iPhone restore, after numerous hardware tests that showed my new phone was in perfect order. The tech felt that the issue was related to messages and now I come across this thread.

I've tried all of the fixes mentioned after restoring a backup again, but the issue persists. I think the only permanent solution will be for me to do another new phone restore and leave my backup off, keeping iCloud info (contacts, photos) but losing years of Messages. I would also need to download all of my Apps again, though Messages is a much higher priority.

Any new ideas out there to avoid a new install?

Hello isurusam,
Thank you for using Apple Support Communities.

I understand from your post that your Messages are using up 44% of your battery usage time after updating to iOS 10.0.1. I recommend maximizing your battery life by following the tips in the article linked below:

Maximizing Battery Life and Lifespan

Background Activity. This indicates that the battery was used by the app while it was in the background — that is, while you were using another app.

To improve battery life, you can turn off the feature that allows apps to refresh in the background. Go to Settings > General > Background App Refresh and set the switch to Off.

Best Regards

Hello Allen A and thanks for the reply. I experience the same problem as isurusam, in less than 4 hours, messages has drained 35% of the battery life of my iPhone (6s) in background activity. Messages is developed by Apple, why is it subobtimal in term of battery life consumption and why do we have to shut its background activity?

I am facing the sambe problem with 6S. In my case even worst. The main problem is that then I have to turn off background activity for all apps, since the message app is native and don't appear on the list of background apps and I am not sure this will solve the problem. Trying now. .

I Have exactly the same issue. iPhone 6S iOS 10.0.1

Messages is eating up my battery. 31% by messages app. It is also showing 2.9 hours of background activity!

I Have noticed this issue too. I saw that my battery started draining very quickly after upgrading to iOS 10 and looked at the battery useage. My apple messaging app is showing over 40% battery useage which seems odd. I have only sent a handful of messages today. Turning off background refresh is not acceptable. The whole point of having a messaging app is that people can, well, message you.

Am experiencing the same problems with my iphone 6S running 10.0.1. On power saver mode and plugged in the battery is still draining if I'm using Messages.

Seems like it is the animated messages that are killing my battery. If I do a hard reset (power button + home button) it seems to resolve until I get another animated message and then the energy bleed happens again.

Just a theory at this point, but I thought I'd put it out there for others to test.

I am having the same issue on my iPhone 6S with iOS 10. Messages background activity is reading all the battery.

71% for me.

It seems that hard reset helped.

I am having the same issue on iPhone SE, Messages is using 63% of battery and that probably counts for a significant drop in battery life I noticed since I upgraded to iOS 10, rebooted the phone and connected it to a charger, will monitor the battery use after it is charged and see whether that helped or not.

I believe it is really the reindexing, especially if you have a lot of messages in the history it might take some time. At my phone it took several hours, now it is back to normal, no heavy background battery consumption by Messages.

I setup my iPhone 6S as new and there weren't any messages but still it's taking massive amount of battery. So must be a bug.

Quick update since last time. I've restarted my phone twice and now Messages consumes only 10% of the battery. Still quite a lot considering the few messages I've sent but better than before.

I'm having the same problem with my dad's iPhone 6S Plus... Messages drained 40% of the battery in background activity (more than 5 hours!!) and you can't even disable background activity for that App!