F J Poblam
Level 1 (26 points)
Safari

Q: Inordinate battery drain on iPad mini 2 with iOS 10

Having upgraded to iOS 10.0.2 I now find my iPad Mini experiences inordinate battery drain when connected to Wi-Fi. I've taken all steps I can find to minimize battery drain, including cutting location services to one app Always (a favored Weather app) and three others "when using". No Background App Refresh. Precious few notifications. all the other steps I could find here and abroad. In "Battery" usage the drainage often shows only "Home & Lock Screen" while quickly dropping from 100% to 50% (like, within an hour or two). My Wi-Fi is through a router communicating with a Comcast modem. I would truly welcome opinions and suggestions.

iPad mini 2 Wi-Fi, Cellular, iOS 9.2

Posted on Sep 25, 2016 7:19 PM

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F J Poblam

Q: Inordinate battery drain on iPad mini 2 with iOS 10

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  • by F J Poblam,

    F J Poblam F J Poblam Sep 25, 2016 7:48 PM in response to F J Poblam
    Level 1 (26 points)
    Safari
    Sep 25, 2016 7:48 PM in response to F J Poblam

    P. S., it is worth noting that on my iPhone 6 plus, with the same set of apps (plus of course phone) and the same battery-saving steps taken, the battery drain is 100% to 91% instead of 100% to 52%!

  • by MichelPM,

    MichelPM MichelPM Sep 25, 2016 8:42 PM in response to F J Poblam
    Level 6 (13,905 points)
    iPad
    Sep 25, 2016 8:42 PM in response to F J Poblam

    Do you have screen brightness turned down?

    Screen brightness can have a BIG effect on battery life.

    How about Bluetooth? Is this off when not using?

    Have you tried a hard reset of your iPad by holding down both the Home and sleep/wake buttons simultaneously until your iPad goes to black and restarts with Apple logo, then release the buttons?

  • by F J Poblam,

    F J Poblam F J Poblam Sep 25, 2016 9:10 PM in response to MichelPM
    Level 1 (26 points)
    Safari
    Sep 25, 2016 9:10 PM in response to MichelPM

    Yes to all: brightness down, bluetooth off (these are obvious measures, of course); and hard reset tried...several times.

  • by Diana.McCall,

    Diana.McCall Diana.McCall Sep 26, 2016 5:46 AM in response to F J Poblam
    Level 5 (4,110 points)
    Apple TV
    Sep 26, 2016 5:46 AM in response to F J Poblam

    Hi. I've a couple of suggestions, both related to unusual WiFi usage. First, I wonder of your iPad is constantly losing connection and reconnecting to WiFi. Your router log may show this, if you can access it. Try Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings. Then restart, hold Sleep and Home buttons until you see the Apple. Reconnect to WiFi and see if that helps.

     

    Second, I wonder if there's intense traffic with iCloud. Try logging out of iCloud, under Settings > iCloud. Log back in. Then leave the iPad on the charger overnight and see if it's happier after that.

  • by F J Poblam,

    F J Poblam F J Poblam Sep 26, 2016 8:30 AM in response to Diana.McCall
    Level 1 (26 points)
    Safari
    Sep 26, 2016 8:30 AM in response to Diana.McCall

    Done. We'll wait and see. N.b., we have a Photos library of 10K pix and I noticed right away upon re-signin to iCloud, Photos is going through an "upload" of all its pix again. (Settings were and had been "Optimize on device".) I can't imagine the effect, or why re-upload. I guess re-syncing. Quite a chore. May take longer than overnight.

  • by F J Poblam,

    F J Poblam F J Poblam Sep 27, 2016 9:17 AM in response to Diana.McCall
    Level 1 (26 points)
    Safari
    Sep 27, 2016 9:17 AM in response to Diana.McCall

    Update as of the next day: having reset Wi-Fi, having logged out and back in iCloud, and having charged overnight, I see that, upon unplugging this morning at 8AM and pursuing no further activity on the iPad thereafter, battery level was down to 54% within two hours. (Battery user shown as "Home & Lock Screen”.) N.b., I *was* connected to Wi-Fi during the period of battery drain. I will try again with Wi-Fi disabled.

  • by F J Poblam,

    F J Poblam F J Poblam Sep 27, 2016 9:19 AM in response to F J Poblam
    Level 1 (26 points)
    Safari
    Sep 27, 2016 9:19 AM in response to F J Poblam

    Edit: [duplicate edit, ignore]