Apple Pencil 2 draining iPad Pro battery

Has anyone else found that leaving their Apple Pencil 2 attached to their iPad Pro 11 overnight drains the battery anywhere from 15%-25%. I did a test of leaving the pencil attached over night and saw a 17% loss in the iPad battery. The pencil was fully charged when I left it connected overnight. So it really had nothing to charge on the pencil. Then I charged the iPad to 100% and left overnight without the pencil attached and the next morning the iPad battery was still at 100%.

Seems like the Apple Pencil 2 is constantly drawing power from the iPad Battery. Was just wondering if anyone else is seeing this behavior. Would like to keep the pencil attached so I know where it is but not if it keeps draining the battery.

iPad Pro 11-inch, Cellular, iOS 12.1

Posted on Nov 21, 2018 5:33 AM

Top-ranking reply

CaoJiayin

Level 1

4 points

Posted on Dec 29, 2018 5:38 PM

I have exactly the same problem.

After several experiments, I found that the iPad's battery won't be drained if I don't attach Apple Pencil 2 on my iPad pro (11 inch).

It is a clear proof that Apple Pencil keeps stealing battery from iPad.

And for your information, there is some energy loss when we talk about wireless charging, it is the cons of wireless charging tech itself, Apple product is no exception. That being said, when your iPad charges your Pencil, there is gonna be some percentage of battery lost during the process without going directly to the Pencil. Adding everything together, it is not hard to imagine the battery will drop so fast.

Short term solution would be finding a good dock or case for your Pencil, put it separately with your iPad. It worked for me.

Long term solution, I guess it is more of an Apple job, is simply not to charge Apple Pencil as long as the battery is not lower than a threshold, which could be exposed to the user. After separating my Pencil for a while, two or three days, I still have 92% battery in it. That said if iPad Pro doesn't automatically charges Apple Pencil before its battery goes lower than 80%, it could very likely save the day.

Of course, it is up to them to solve the problem.

To me, this gen iPad is good, but not perfect, it has a lot of flaws, this is just one of them you will have to bear with to enjoy your fullscreen experience, :)

View in context

86 replies

oriffet

Level 1

4 points

Mar 11, 2019 2:03 PM in response to xenzo

Version of iOS : 12.1.4 (16D57)

For information : my battery during 15 hours (no use)

May 1, 2019 9:23 PM in response to MichelPM

If the apple pencil is 100% charged, does it still drain battery from the ipad? I mean, the software should stop it from charging.

MichelPM

Level 10

81,535 points

May 26, 2019 6:02 AM in response to spiderman0616

Never mind.

I thought I was responding to a different Apple Pencil post.

There have been quite a few of Apple Pencil issues overnight.

Jdt1998

Level 1

4 points

Aug 9, 2019 4:17 PM in response to peterfromsarasota

Apple should put a feature on the next update to give u the option to turn it off when you don’t need it to save the battery

tayphi

Level 1

10 points

Sep 15, 2019 11:42 AM in response to Carvitara

How do you get yours to stay? When i try that the magnet just flips it around back to the charge position.

Oct 15, 2019 6:53 AM in response to peterfromsarasota

Our students use the Notability app on their 9.7 iPad (with Apple Pencil) and it seem like they are charging their iPads every two hours.

Mar 26, 2019 5:03 AM in response to peterfromsarasota

Issue is mostly fixed for me in iOS 12.2 update from yesterday. The Apple Pencil part of the problem is gone. The Pencil stays charged at 100%, and the lightning bolt icon never goes away in the battery widget after a few hours like it did before. I did not wake up this morning to see the Pencil drained down to 85% either. The Pencil is also not warm to the touch like it used to be sometimes. So I think we can call this half of the issue solved.

The iPad half of the problem is still not fully fixed in my opinion. My iPad still went from 100% to 91% in about 17 hours while not being used and with the Pencil attached. I will say I’m not seeing a huge spike in battery drain between 3 and 6 am during the night like I was before, so they definitely changed something. The drain I’m still getting on the iPad is better than it was for sure, but I still don’t think it should take this much power away from the iPad to keep the Pencil charged. The Pencil should be able to intelligently let the iPad know when it needs charge and when it doesn’t, not just constantly draw power from the iPad. Maybe I’m expecting too much, I don’t know.

I do wonder if some of my battery drain last night was just because of my iPad settling down from the update. I’m going to let it sit today too and see if the drain is improved or not.

Meatius

Level 1

8 points

May 26, 2019 3:33 AM in response to MichelPM

Quite a rude reply, we are all aware that the pencil drains the iPad to get its charge but surely when the pencil is fully charged and the pad is left on standby and neither are in use it shouldn’t drain 40% off the battery overnight. You complete fool, this is a design flaw obviously and a simple piece of IF THEN programming would solve the issue

Ntella

Level 1

4 points

Jan 19, 2019 7:44 AM in response to peterfromsarasota

All you need to do is turn the bluetooth off and leave the pencil attached. Only took me 4 months to figure out.

Jan 26, 2019 10:00 AM in response to spiderman0616

Still the same issue with the battery draining even with the 12.1.3 update

mrfigz

Level 1

8 points

Aug 25, 2019 6:10 AM in response to Carvitara

Yes. Turn the pencil around so it’s not in the charging position. It works better with an iPad case with the pencil holder. That way the pencil doesn’t need to be magnetized to the iPad.

This thread has been closed by the system or the community team. You may vote for any posts you find helpful, or search the Community for additional answers.

Apple Pencil 2 draining iPad Pro battery