What happens if you enable iOS 9’s battery saving Low Power Mode all the time? Matt Birchler (via MacStories) did some unscientific tests, which returned some interesting results. He enabled the feature on certain days of the week and compared his remaining battery life to days it was disabled.
Here’s his graph below—as you can see, Low Power Mode saw battery remaining at the end of the day hovering around the 50% mark:
Birchler says in his casual tests, his iPhone 6 Plus battery went through battery 38.7% slower in Low Power Mode:
There is a definite separation between the days where Low Power Mode is used and the days when it is not. Even the best day in normal mode pales in comparison to the worst day of Low Power Mode. On average, my iPhone chewed through battery 38.7% slower when in Low Power Mode. This is a drastic difference! And while this is not a huge concern for me (my 6 Plus makes it through everyday without needing a charge), this would make all the difference to those with iPhones that are struggling to get the battery life they would like.
Of course, while in Low Power Mode, your phone’s display dims faster than normal, animations are disabled and the CPU clock speed is slowed down, plus background updates don’t happen as often, all in an effort to save battery life. Low Power Mode pops up as an option once your battery hits 20% remaining. Once you charge your battery to 80%, Low Power Mode will disable itself.
Are you using Low Power Mode? Has it saved you from running out of battery?
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I leave the low-power on mode at all time. In the past I need 2-3 charges per day for sure. Now I can make it thru the day without recharging. I don’t like the lower CPU speed but the battery in my iPhone 6 is a joke.
Are you on your phone 24/7? I think the 6 has great battery life. I use my phone quit regularly for work – gps, pushed emails, browsing while bored in meetings and I get easily a full day out of my battery – compared to the 5 I’d say battery performance is 25% better.
Odd, the battery life on mine is awesome. I wonder if you have an app running rouge or you or something. Sometimes odd social media apps can go crazy if you don’t turn off background data for that specific app.
I love low power mode! I haven’t been using it 24/7 but maybe I will now after reading this!
“the CPU clock speed is slowed down”
Does this actually mean the max clock speed is capped? A power-efficient chip I think would be able to lower its clock speed during periods of low activity, then ramp up to 100% when needed. Intel’s desktop CPUs have this ability, not to mention “Turbo Boost” going the other way (overclocking)
Yes it does. The performance of the phone goes into the low power mode, meani u as few resources as it can while preserving battery power.
I’d probably be happy using the low power mode all the time if it weren’t for the always-showing battery percentage when its enabled. Even if the number is going down slower, psychologically I feel more aware of it draining when I can watch the digits counting down!
Personally. I use the percentage anyways. My mind isn’t satisfied looking at a bar and guessing within 15-20%. I would go mad.
Anyone know if there’s a way to set it where it doesn’t turn off once the battery is full (or close to full)? I don’t mind having it on all the time but it’s a pain to have to turn it on daily.
I don’t think that’s possible at this point.
I’m still on 8.4 for my jailbreak. Thanks for the confirmation. It was a feature I was looking forwards to without a jailbreak. Saved me some hassle from updating.