Unusually high battery drain is a symptom, not a problem. There are many possible causes for this symptom. In theory, as many as there are apps installed on the phone.
Sudden change in battery drain is caused by an app or apps that are using more energy than they should. It can happen at any time, but is slightly more likely after an update, because the update process interrupts apps in the middle of some activity, either foreground or background, and some apps do not recover cleanly and get stuck attempting to repeat a failed data update, essentially forever. Killing the app doesn't always resolve it, because the real problem is data that was corrupted by the interruption, and the app will continue trying to recover the corrupted data after it restarts.
MS Exchange email accounts will do this frequently, due to a bug in the Microsoft ActiveSync process which, unfortunately can never be fixed, because it would break millions (billions) of older MS Exchange clients that cannot be updated. If you have an MS Exchange account the only fix is to delete the account, restart the phone, and add it back. Or have your administrator restart the MS Exchange server (which most admins don't really want to do). If you are interested I can provide technical details on this bug, but I don't want to distract from solving the problem.
Other IMAP email accounts can exhibit a similar problem; again, the easiest solution is to delete the account, then add it back. As the email server is always the master for IMAP accounts no messages will be lost.
Accounts that sync data from a server (and this includes iCloud) can get out of sync between the server and the iPhone. Given enough time this can resolve itself (at least for iCloud), but it's easier to shut down the sync service, restart the phone, and start it up again. Yes, even for iCloud syncing. And I had to do this over the weekend when my iCloud Contacts stopped syncing correctly. It took about 14 hours for my contacts to again sync.
As many 3rd party apps sync with a server all can be suspect. That's why checking to see which apps are using the most energy in Settings/Battery is a good diagnostic step.
Hi Guys
Fixed!
I’ve turned my phone off (first time since update) and disabled Siri, left phone active overnight and only lost 5% battery, so fingers crossed it has done the trick
Sent from Steve's iPhone
My 7+ is less than 6 months old and my battery had no issues until I downloaded the latest iOS update. I found by turning off Siri and iCloud, my battery performance returned to very close to what the battery life was before the update.
6 weeks ago I bought a NEW iPhone 7 and updated to 11.2.5 and I had the problems which are outlined above. I tried iMessage on/off, iCloud on/off, ... and further made a reset. No improvement. I installed 11.2.6. No improvement.
I think the last thing I tried was to set the default time for the lock screen from 1 minute to 30 seconds.
Now my battery-lifetime is normal !!! since 3 weeks.
Cause I tried many things I am not definetely sure that the problem was the lock screen time. But I am sure the problem with the battery is not a hardware problem.
@apple: It's definitely a software problem.
MavraH
Can you see if you have the iCloud Drive setting turned on WITHIN iCloud on your iPhone? If so and you turn it off, does your battery drain return to normal?
For me turning iMessages off and on in Settings -> Messages fixed this issue. Before my phone would be drained at the end of the day and now it easily lasts the whole day again.
In my case, changing my Apple ID password seems to have fixed the drain. Also, I deativated everything from iCloud (calendar, safari..) except for Notes.
Interestingly I removed the sim and ran the phone just using WiFi. Used it continuously for over 9 hours and still have 26% battery!
I received a new iPhone 7 back from apple after a repair, this has iOS 11.2.1 still. The sim is installed, I’m tethering and using the apps continuously. 3 hours later, I’m still on 88%. So it is definitely an issue with iOS 11.2.5.
i noticed an improvement after during the following: drained the battery down to 0%, turned off Siri, and praying.
The battery life isn't what it was before the 11.2.5 update but it is decently better than immediately after updating. Good luck everyone.
I've downloaded the Battery Life App, and it does indicate that my wear level is very high. It is suspiciously coincidental that prior to my upgrade (3-4 years) the battery drainage seemed really impressive, but afterwards it was severely degraded. There are some users here that have reported there iPhone X's experiencing the same symptoms after upgrading to 11.2.5.
But for the sake of trying to be constructive, perhaps they are experiencing a separate problem, and I'm going to take my iPhone 6s to get the battery replaced (I'll have to pay $79 since according to the Apple website doesn't full under the allowed discounted group for some reason), and if need be do a factory reset of the phone. I'm willing to invest $79 and a few hours for a decisive conclusion to this issue:
- If issue is resolved - Perhaps the issue WAS the battery, OR a run away App behavior, OR a combination of both
- If issue is not resolved - My time with Apple is officially at an end.
Hi Diane, I was running an iPhone 6s on the updated iOS 11.2.5 whilst my iPhone 7 was in for repair. The battery was draining fast and losing around 1% per min even when idle.
I received a new iPhone 7 from apple with iOS 11.2.1 installed. I took the sim out of the iPhone 6s and put it in the iPhone 7. I continued to run the iPhone 6s using WiFi only and used all the apps and video etc, battery life is great (15 hours and still on 15%). It would seem that the battery drain is linked to being on a mobile network or in the phone software that related to this.
My iPhone 7 running iOS 11.2.1 is fantastic! I’ve been using it for the last 5 hours on the phone network, apps and even tethering to the iPhone 6s. The battery is still on 78%!
So in my humble opinion, the issue is definitely the new iOS 11.2.5, apple should investigate this as it is a shambles.
Same here. Brand new iPhone 8 64Gb (bought two weeks ago) with installed and re-installed 1.2.5 in DFU mode after a several conversations with apple support guys on battery issue. Background apps refresh, "hey Siri", iCloud drive and all those geo-things are turned off. Battery drains very fast! turned on screen on idle eats about 1% for 1 minute. i get max 5 to 7 hours of very (i mean VERY!) light usage of ios built-in apps (camera, phone, imessage). Last time the support guy told me i should try to reinstall the firmware again because i did it the wrong way - i used DFU mode (with black screen during installation) instead of normal reinstall (with "connect to itunes" logo on the screen).
To add a little more context, since I've commented on this thread from the beginning, is that I have two iPhone 6s'
- Personal
- Business
I've kept them both at the same version throughout the years, and both had excellent, and the same battery life (works for about 24 hours with a single charge and I use them both about the same). The moment I upgrade my personal phone to 11.2.5, is when the problems started occurring (detailed heavily in this thread). I have to charge my personal 3-4 times a day. My business phone keeps asking me to upgrade since it's still on 11.2.2, which I will not.
I would like to add one additional detail I noticed over the weekend in case anyone seems to be noticing this.
I've scheduled a battery replacement of my iPhone for now, but in the meantime, since my battery usage is now down to less than 3 hours on a single charge, out of necessity, I switched over to podcasts for my media intact.
I noticed when I watch videos, or read books on my iPhone (either on iBooks or NOOK or Safari) basically anything that requires my screen to turn on, the battery drains extremely rapidly. Literally 1% every minute, and within 2 hours or so it's dead. However, if I listen to music or Podcasts (even streaming podcasts) the phone would last over 12 hours and still have battery to spare. When I turn on my screen I see the battery percentage drop about 1% every single minute.
So while this doesn't answer anything, it's interesting that my phone can last 12 hours so long as I make sure the screen stays off. It's obvious that the battery will drain faster if the screen is on. But this rate of depletion seems disproportionate to what I've noticed my phone doing over the last 3-4 years.
We'll see if a battery swap, and possible Factory Reset fixes this behavior. Found some pretty awesome Podcasts in the meantime 🙂
So something awful and terrible and frustrating actually resulted in something productive.
It would be interesting to see if removing the sim from affected phones slows down the battery drainage.
It will start an iCloud sync, unless you go to iCloud settings and turn off the sync switches.
IOS 11.2.5 battery drain
