iPhone 4S Battery Issue
Monday, October 17, 2011 at 3:55PM I mentioned on the MacRoundtable last night that the battery performance on my iPhone 4S had "fallen off a cliff".
After using the iPhone 4 since it was launched, I never had any issues with the battery retaining at least 50% charge, after a light to moderate days usage.
I knew something was up when I picked up the iPhone 4S after being charged up overnight and seeing the battery fall to 97% within a few minutes. It seemed as though the battery was dropping in front of my eyes!
It would appear that this was a common problem on Twitter, even though many people were seeing better battery life than previously on their older iPhones.
What to do!
Well, last night, I received several tweets advising me to restore the iPhone 4S as that seemed to cure the problem.
So, after the iPhone expired on me, I charged it up so I could use the phone again.
I then did a full DFU restore of the iPhone.
Full instructions are here:
http://osxdaily.com/2010/06/24/iphone-dfu-mode-explained-and-how-to-enter-dfu-mode-on-your-iphone/
I'm not sure if you need a full DFU restore, try a normal restore if necessary.
Once the OS was restored, I then restored the phone from my last backup.
After the phone was restored, I went to bed and charged it up overnight.
This morning it held it's full 100% charge for 20 minutes or so, then dropped down to 98%.
By lunchtime, it was in the mid 80's - just as I used to get with my iPhone 4.
So if you are suffering with poor battery performance, try giving it a restore.
You may find it makes a world of difference!
Reader Comments (7)
Don,
I noticed the same thing on my iPhone 4 since installing IOS 5. While not as bad as yours, I'm seeing a more rapid battery drain than when I was on IOS 4.35 so I wonder if its not the hardware, but IOS 5 itself. Setting a Reminder for example with a geo fence uses the GPS constantly so the phone knows when to trigger the reminder. I suspect that would cause rapid battery drain too.
I had a similar issue with my iPhone 4 when I first had it on launch. What I think it came down to was the fact that I restored all of my data from my previous iPhone 3GS.
I ended up setting the iPhone 4 up afresh and set everything up again manually. I never had any battery problems after that.
So when I got my iPhone 4S, I did exactly the same thing and I haven't had any issues with battery life.
Thanks for the tip. I'm going to try it, as my battery life on the 4S has been much, much worse than it was on my 4. I've been regretting handing my 4 down to my husband!
You might be interested to know that several of us are having similar issues. Some have reported success with the restore approach while others have not. https://discussions.apple.com/message/16443080
It's just a little odd that this would help on an iPhone 4s since it came factory installed with iOS 5.
Hi guys,
I got my new 4s yesterday and my battery is was draining like crazy after the first recharge much 10x faster than on my 3GS. I tried the tip and reset all settings on the 4s and since 2 hours is at 100% so i think it helped, before it was dropping like 1% every 7 minutes in standby.
Thanks!!!
I got the same problem with my iPhone 4S. My only temporal solution was to buy a battery case for my iPhone on and wait until Apple release an update that fix this issue. I know it is not the best solution but at least it let me use my mobile more than 5 hours.