I've had iOS 26.1 installed on my iPhone 15 for about 3 weeks now, and my battery power has been draining like nobody's business ever since. I'll go from a full charge to 20% in less than 4 hours doing regular tasks like making phone calls, checking emails, browsing the web, ETC, and carrying a portable charger while I'm out and about is now mandatory. Someone mentioned in passing to me that iOS 26 is a lot harder on devices than 18 was, so I'm curious whether anyone else is struggling to get through the day on a single charge after updating.
Comments
maybe upgrade aftershocks
I had a similar experience during the first days after upgrade and believe this came from processes that optimize the system after upgrade. anyway in my case it normalized over time.
Check battery health.
Coincidences happen, your battery could be failing. Look in settings, battery, battery health and find out what the maximum capacity is.
Hood luck.
Check battery health.
Coincidences happen, your battery could be failing. Look in settings, battery, battery health and find out what the maximum capacity is.
Hood luck.
Try disabling background app refresh
Turning off background app refresh my extend your daily battery life a bit.
HTH.
not as bad but
Mine isn't quite this bad, but definitely not what it used to be. I also have the iPhone 15. I think it's time to upgrade.
Battery Health
My battery health is at 86%, which isn't great but would be considered "normal" for a 2-yearold device. In any case, this drainage issue only showed itself once I installed iOS 26, so I'm really not convinced that my battery is ready to go kaput anyway.
Screen brightness
I'm sure you already have, but make sure you haven't accidentally turned your screen brightness up high - even with screen curtain this matters. My ipad was eating insane battery a couple of weeks ago and that's was what it was.
Also check the battery settings to see if a particular app's gone rogue - Safari's a bit prone to this for example.
Liquid Glass
I'm surprised no one's brought this one up, but it's probably liquid glass, Apple's new UI appearance, itself. You can do some things to minimize it, but I'm afraid you can't turn it off.
I forget the exact settings to change at the moment but can look later.
battery health
It is the same for me on my iPhone 15 Pro, but for me it is 30 percent after the end of the day. Battery health is at 86 percent, but I don't want to get a 17 pro this year because it is just too expensive for me to buy a new phone all two years. I hope I get it through until iPhone 18 lineup comes out.
Same
I have an iPhone 17 and am shocked at how quickly the battery drains. I usually charge my phone to 90 percent in the morning and am down to around 30 by the end of the day. Background refresh is off, screen brightness 0, battery health shows nothing unusual. I believe it's iOS 26.
I am also on an iPhone 15 but I haven’t seen this issue
I am also on an iPhone 15 but I haven’t seen this issue. I’m wondering if it’s because I bought a brand new iPhone 15 directly from the Apple Store in August this year. So maybe the battery hasn’t done any kind of I need you or draining or anything and iOS 26.1. Hopefully this issue will get fixed really soon though. When was the last time you’ve restarted your phone? Sometimes this can clear up a lot of weird things. I’m going to have to do this with my phones as well actually. My secondary device is a iPhone SE third generation, but they also haven’t seen any battery drainage on that either.
16 pro mx
No issues at this time with it, just bugs. Long live cats.
Some Improvement After Restarting
OK, I rebooted my phone and things seem to be slightly better. I still feel that iOS 26 puts a lot of unnecessary wear and tear on our devices, but I can now go about 6 hours without having to charge. Not great but I'll take it—I really want this phone to last me another year if possible.
Me too!
Thank goodness I'm not the only one. yes, I've discovered that too. It seemed like facetime may have been the culpret because it seems to be using a lot more battery than usual, but then again, so does everything else it seems. My battery health is at 89% after having the phone since December of 2021.