iOS 13 Battery Drain: 15+ Tips to Make Your Battery Last Longer

 There are concerns about battery life and rapid battery drain with any new operating system update, and iOS 13 is no exception. We've seen reports of battery life problems since iOS 13 was launched, which have waxed and waned with various iOS 13 updates.

Until Apple releases updates to fix the problems, iOS 13 battery life issues caused by bugs can not be helped, but there are measures you can take to optimise your battery life and cut down on hidden sources that could cause excess drainage.

1. Limit When and How Often Apps Access Your Location

Testing your location settings to prevent apps from accessing your location for privacy purposes is a smart idea, but it can also be useful for your battery life. Here's how to access your settings for Location Services:

1. 1.Open up the Settings app.
2. 2.Choose Privacy.
3. 3.Tap Location Services.
4. 4.Review the list and edit settings by tapping on the name of each app in the list.
5. Thanks to some updates introduced in iOS 13, you have four possible options for location settings for each app, although not all four options will always be available for each app, depending on what it does. The following options can be selected: Never, Ask Next Time, While using the App, and Always.
6. 
   It will never stop an app from ever accessing your location, and setting location access to Never is the safest option unless there's a legitimate need for an app to know where you are, such as a mapping app.
7. The next time that it needs your location, Ask Next Time will prompt an app to ask you with a popup, so you can temporarily authorise it. With this configuration, location access is turned off before the popup expressly requires it.
8. As the name indicates, using the app helps the app to detect your location only when the app is accessible and actively used. If you close the app or turn to another app, access to the location terminates.
9. It always allows an app, whether open or closed, to have access to your location at all times. This will result in the most battery drain, and only the apps you use the most should be restricted.
10. Many apps will ask for location data that doesn't really need it to operate (for example, a banking app might want location access to display nearby ATMs, which is also accessible by entering a zip code), so clearing the cruft here will ensure that without express permission, no apps access your location.
11. You may also disable Location Services all together, but most people do not want to do it because applications such as Maps can mess with it.

12. 2. Limit Apps Using Bluetooth

13. IOS 13 introduced a feature that lets you know when Bluetooth access has been requested by users, and there are a surprising number of apps that want to use Bluetooth for items such as Bluetooth beacon location tracking or Chromecast application scanning.
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15. This is a good list to check to ensure that without your permission you do not have a sly app in the background connecting to Bluetooth outlets as that can drain the battery. Allowing Bluetooth access to applications that need it for Bluetooth-enabled accessories is totally great, but nixing access to retail stores is definitely a smart idea. Here's how the Bluetooth settings can be accessed:
16. 1. 1.Open the Settings app.
    2. 2.Tap Privacy.
    3. 3.Tap Bluetooth.
    4. Toggle off any app from this list that doesn't require a Bluetooth link to work. With the toggling off, it's better to be liberal — if you disable access and then a feature inside an app stops working properly, you can just turn back on Bluetooth.
    5. Bluetooth can also be fully switched off, which could save a bit of battery life, but for most people, it's not a great idea since Bluetooth is used for AirPods, Apple Watches, and other accessories.

    6. 3. Turn on Low Power Mode

    7. Low Power Mode has been around for a couple of years now, and if you're worried about battery life, it's the number one best setting to allow. It cuts down on background activity including downloads behind the scenes and more easily decreases the brightness of your monitor after inactivity.
    8. 1. 
    9. When the battery life on the iPhone is at 20 percent, a popup to allow Low Power Mode will appear, but you can enable it at any time by tapping on the battery icon or asking Siri to turn it on through the Control Center. Alternatively, in the Settings app, it's available:
    10. Open Settings.
    11. Scroll down and tap Battery.
    12. Tap the Low Power Mode toggle.

    With Low Power Mode turned on, your battery icon at the top of your iPhone will be yellow, which lets you know when it's active. Some people like to keep Low Power Mode on at all times, but know that it does need to be enabled regularly because it automatically turns off when the iPhone is charged.

    4. Use WiFi Whenever Possible

    WiFi requires less power than a cellular connection, so, if possible, Apple recommends connecting to WiFi to improve battery life. For instance, WiFi should be activated at home or work, saving cellular data and battery life.

    

    5. Activate Airplane Mode in Low Signal Areas

    WiFi requires less power than a cellular connection, so, if possible, Apple recommends connecting to WiFi to improve battery life. For instance, WiFi should be activated at home or work, saving cellular data and battery life.

    
    Airplane Mode will prevent your iPhone from endlessly searching for a signal, saving the battery until you can get to a place with a better connection.

    6. Make Sure Your Battery is Healthy

    Battery drain can be due to a battery that's old and no longer functioning in optimal condition. You can check the health of your battery by following these steps:

    1. Open the Settings app.
    2. Scroll down and tap Battery.
    3. Tap on Battery Health.

    There is a listing in the Battery Health section for "Full Power," which is a battery capacity indicator compared to when it was new.

    If the capacity is below 80 percent, a battery replacement may be worth looking for. Under the one-year warranty plan or under AppleCare+ for free, Apple can repair a battery that is below 80 percent power.

    Otherwise, replacing the battery will cost between $49 and $69 depending on which iPhone you have.

    You may want to toggle on Optimized Battery Charging under the Battery Health section in the Settings app to make sure your iPhone battery stays healthy longer. Optimized battery charging enables the iPhone to learn the charging schedule so that it can wait until you need it to charge more than 80%.

    
    

    If you put your phone on the charger at night, for example, the Optimized Battery Charging setting could hold the iPhone at an 80% charge, filling it up close to when you wake up to reduce the ageing of the battery.

    In order to prevent irreversible battery damage due to heat or cold, Apple also suggests avoiding extreme temperatures, as well as eliminating such cases while charging. If your iPhone gets warm when charging, it's safer to take the case off for a longer period of time to keep your battery safe.

    7. Manage Apps That Are Draining Battery

    The iPhone shows you which applications use the most power, so without your knowledge, you can make sure nothing secretly drains your battery. By opening the Settings app and tapping on the battery portion, you can check your battery consumption statistics.
    Over the last 24 hours or 10 days, there are charts here that let you see your battery level, as well as the applications that have used the most battery life. You can delete it if there's any app that you don't need that seems to drain an excessive amount of battery.
    
    
    For apps you do need, you can moderate how often you're using the app to cut down on battery drain.
    
    

    This section will also tell you how much time apps spend using Background App Refresh.

    8. Limit Background Activity

    Apps, both first and third-party, use background app refreshing features to update even when they're not open to do things like load mail messages and download updates so they're ready to use at all times.
    
    1. Background App Refresh can affect battery life, so it can help make your battery last longer by turning it off. All together, you can turn off the Background App Refresh or choose which apps in the background can refresh.
    2. 1.Open the Settings app.
    3. 2.Select General.
    4. 3.Choose Background App Refresh.
    5. From here, you can tap the Background App Refresh option again to turn Background App Refresh off all together or choose to have it activate only when connected to WiFi, which doesn't drain battery as much as downloading over cellular.
    6. You can also choose to turn Background App Refresh on just for your most used apps by tapping on the toggle next to each app in the list.
    9. Adjust Mail Fetch Settings
    In addition to turning off Background Refresh, adjusting when and how often the Mail app checks for new emails can save some battery life.
    1. Tap "Fetch New Data" at the bottom.
    2. 1.Open up the Settings app.
    3. 2.Tap Mail
    4. 3.Tap Accounts
    5. 4.Tap "Fetch New Data" at the bottom.
    6. From here, you can turn off Push (which lets you know right away when a new email message is available) and adjust Fetch settings on a per account basis for accounts that don't support Push (like Gmail accounts).
    7. Adjusting the Fetch settings to have longer intervals before checking for new messages can help save battery life, as can turning off Fetch all together in favour of manual checks that will download new messages only when the Mail app is opened.
    8. you can choose the following settings: Automatically, Manually, Hourly, Every 30 Minutes, and Every 15 Minutes.

    9. 10. Limit Notifications

       Cutting down on the number of notifications that apps are sending is a good way to save a little bit of battery life. If you have apps inundating you with notifications, it's going to drain battery every time your screen lights up and your phone makes a connection, plus a glut of notifications is just plain annoying.
       

       
       Adjust your notification settings in the Settings app by following these instructions:

       1. 1.Open the Settings app.
       2. 2.Tap Notifications.
       3. 3.Go through each app and adjust whether or not an app can send you notifications by tapping on the toggle.

       4. If you do allow notifications, you can choose to allow apps to show on the Lock screen, in the Notification Center, as banners, or all three.

       5. Apple also has this useful function that allows you to change your notification settings on the Lock screen right from the notification itself. Just press on a notification for a long time and then tap the three dots (...) to access options like Quietly Deliver or Turn Off.
       6. 
          Deliver Quietly allows notifications to appear in Notification Center but not the Lock screen, while Turn Off lets you turn off notifications for that app entirely.

       7. 11. Disable Automatic Downloads and App Updates

       8. If you're often low on battery, you may not want your iPhone doing things that you're not explicitly initiating, such as automatically downloading apps downloaded on other devices and downloading software and app updates.
       9. Apple has a feature designed to synchronise software between all of your devices by installing apps that have already been downloaded to other devices on one computer. So if you download an app on an iPad, for example, Automatic Download would also download the app on your iPhone.

       10. If that's a feature you want, leave that enabled, but if it's not, you can turn it off by following these steps:

           1. 1.Open the Settings app.
           2. 2.Tap on your profile picture.
           3. 3.Tap on iTunes & App Store.
           4. 4.Toggle off Music, Apps, and Books & Audiobooks.
           Make sure to turn off App Updates as well if you just don't want apps to download on their own. Leaving this on helps iPhone users to automatically update when the App Store launches new updates.

       11. You can also turn off automatic iOS updates if desired by following these steps:

           1. 1.Open the Settings app.
           2. 2.Tap General.
           3. 3.Tap Software Update.
           4. 4.Tap Automatic Updates.
           5. 5.Tap the toggle to turn updates off.

           12. Activate Dark Mode

       12. Make sure to turn off App Updates as well if you just don't want apps to download on their own. Leaving this on helps iPhone users to automatically update when the App Store launches new updates.

       13. 
           On devices with an OLED display like the iPhone X, XS, XS Max, 11 Pro, and 11 Pro Max, Dark Mode can save a bit of battery life, so it's worth enabling. Here's how:

       1. 1.Open the Settings app.
       2. 2.Choose Display & Brightness.
       3. 3.Tap the "Dark" option.
       4. If you press the "Automatic" button, with the sunset and the sunrise every day, Dark Mode will turn on or off, enabling you to switch between dark and light mode.
       5. The Control Center can also activate Dark Mode, which is a quick way to activate it if your system is not in automatic mode.

       6. 13. Turn Down Device Brightness

       7. If you're in a bright room or in direct sunlight, you probably can't help but have the brightness of the screen turned up all the way, but dimming it down can conserve battery life if you don't need a super bright monitor.
       8. Brightness can be controlled by using the brightness toggle on the iPhone via the Control Center or by using the Settings app's Display & Brightness section. To ensure that your screen is not overly bright in darker rooms by default, it is a good idea to turn on the auto-brightness setting, but some manual adjustment may be necessary in brighter rooms and in the sun.

       9. 14. Adjust Auto-Lock and Turn Off Raise to Wake

       10. Setting the Auto-Lock on the display to as low as you can tolerate is a good idea, which will cause the display of the iPhone to turn off after a short period of inactivity.
       11. You can select ranges from 30 seconds to never, but when it's not necessary, the lower end of the spectrum can help conserve battery life by cutting the display.
       12. If you really want to save your battery, it may help to turn off Raise to Wake, although it may make features such as Face ID less convenient. It is a fairly easy choice to lift to Wake, so this should be a final resort.

       13. 15. Make Sure Everything's Up to Date

       1. Make sure you have the new update updated if you are running iOS 13, because since it was launched, Apple has been making changes and refinements to the operating system. This is how to check:
       2. 1.Open Settings.
       3. 2.Tap General.
       4. 3.Tap Software Update.

       From here, the iPhone will let you know if your software is up to date or if there's a new version available.

       You should also make sure all of your apps are up to date, which you can do in the App Store.

       1. 1.Open up the App Store.
       2. 2.Tap on your profile in the upper right.
       3. 3.Swipe downwards to refresh everything.
       4. 4.Tap on Update All.

       The update section of the App Store is also a great way to cull apps. If you see an update for an app you don't use often, swipe to the left on it and you can delete it right then and there.

       16. Don't Close Apps

       By using the App Switcher, several battery life guides will suggest manually closing apps to prevent them from running in the background, but this does not save battery life and can actually drain more battery.
       Apps in the background are paused and battery life is not used when not in active use. Closing an app purges it from the RAM of the iPhone, requiring reloading when it reopens, which can have a greater battery impact.
       17. Restart
       5. 1. Sometimes an app can act up or a background process can go dark, and simply restarting your iPhone is the best solution. Follow these steps if you have an iPhone 8 or newer:
          2. 1.Press and release the Volume Up button.
          3. 2.Press and release the Volume Down button.
          4. 3.Press and hold the Side button until the Apple logo appears, and then release the Side button.

          If you have an iPhone 7 or earlier, follow these steps to restart:

          1. 1.Hold down the Volume Down button and the Sleep/Wake button at the same time.
          2. 2.Keep holding until until the screen goes dark and the Apple logo appears on the display.
          3. 3.Release the button.

          After the Apple logo appears, it will take a minute or so for the iPhone to start back up.
          

       6. 18. Restore as New

       7. If you're at the end of your wits and nothing helps to improve significant battery drain, you can try restoring and setting up your iPhone as new to eliminate any potential problems behind the scenes. This should be a last resort, as it can be a hassle to start from scratch.

       8. First and foremost, make sure you have an iCloud backup.

          1. 1.On a Mac with Catalina, open Finder. On a Mac with Mojave or earlier, open iTunes. On a Windows machine, open iTunes.
          2. 2.Plug your iPhone into your computer.
          3. 3.If you're prompted to enter a device passcode or to click a Trust This Computer prompt, do so.
          4. 4.Select your device from the side bar in Finder or the side bar in iTunes.
          5. 5.Click on the Restore open. If you're signed into Find My, you'll be prompted to sign out.
          6. 6.Click Restore again to confirm.
          7. You can set your computer up as if it were a new device after restoring it. You can restore from the backup of iCloud that you created before the restoration, but you may want to try starting fresh to avoid any potential problems.

          8. Other Tips

          9. There are a lot of tips and guides for battery saving on the internet, and there were some other dubious tips suggested by people that could or may not save a lot of battery life. It's difficult to say, but it's not terrible idea to try any of these choices if they're features you don't need.
          10. These tips should be used judiciously and after the above tips, since it might not be the most desirable way to conserve battery to turn off every feature on the iPhone.
          11. • Disable "Hey Siri" so the iPhone isn't listening for the wake word.
              • Turn off Siri entirely.
              • Turn off Screen Time.
              • Turn off Siri Suggestions.
              • Turn off motion effects.
              • Turn off AirDrop.
              • Turn off vibrate.
              • Use Safari content blockers.
              • Don't use Live or Dynamic wallpapers.
              • Turn down volume.
              • Turn down the brightness level of the Flashlight feature in Control Center.
          12.