Over the course of owning and using an iPad, you might find the battery life steadily decreases, and it needs to be charged more and more frequently. However, there are many tricks you can make use of to help improve your iPad battery lifespan.
So how long does an iPad battery last? And how can you increase iPad battery life?
Keep reading for our suggestions on how to get the most out of your iPad battery life.
Check Battery Usage
When trying to improve your battery life, the first step is to check the current health of your battery and find out which apps are draining the most power. To do this open ‘Settings’, then ‘Battery’, and then ‘Battery Health’.
Here, you can see as a percentage the maximum capacity your iPad has. A brand new iPad with 100% battery capacity should last 10 hours without needing to be charged.
Tap ‘Show Detailed Usage’ from the Battery page on your iPad to get an insight into which apps consume the most battery power. Consider uninstalling the apps which drain your battery but are not essential to have downloaded to your tablet.
This will make a big difference to your iPad battery usage.
It’s also worth mentioning a common misconception here: closing your app windows does not save you battery power! It is only when the apps are actively running a process (such as downloading a file or playing a song) that they consume battery power.
Adjust Connection Settings
It’s important to be aware of the different connection settings on your iPad. If you leave these settings enabled when not using them, this can be a huge drain on your battery power.
For example, if you are at home watching a movie on your iPad via your WiFi connection, you can turn off your cellular data, Bluetooth, and location services. Equally, if you are using your iPad to read a book in the park, you can turn your WiFi off in addition to the other connection settings mentioned. This will make a huge difference to your battery life.
These settings can be accessed by opening ‘Settings’, then clicking into each specific connection and turning it off. Scroll down a little to ‘Privacy’ to turn off your location services.
An even quicker way of doing this is to tap these buttons from your control center (swipe up from your home screen) or even by turning on Airplane Mode.
Low Power Mode
A simple way to save battery power on your iPad is by turning on low power mode. You can do this by heading to ‘Settings’ then ‘Battery’, and toggle on ‘Low Power Mode’.
You’ll find your iPad automatically prompts you to do this when you get down to 20% battery, but if you know you’ve got a long day ahead of you without many charging opportunities, why not enable this from 100%?
Turning on low power mode will pause background processes such as checking for new mail and refreshing background apps. Automatic downloads will also be paused if you have this setting enabled.
Change Auto-Lock and Screen Brightness
Next up are a couple more setting changes that can make a significant difference to your battery life. First, let’s take a look at the auto-lock function.
This setting controls the duration of inactivity after which your iPad will lock and the screen will turn off. You can change this by going to ‘Settings’, then ‘Display & Brightness’, and selecting ‘Auto-Lock’. Here, you can choose how soon you want your screen to lock after inactivity.
The shorter the period, the more battery life you will save!
Changing the brightness of your screen will also help extend the battery life of your iPad. Of course, the amount you can adjust your screen brightness by will be determined by your lighting conditions. Sitting outside in the sun will require higher brightness, but this can be reduced in darker indoor settings.
You can also turn on auto-brightness, which means the iPad will automatically sense the level of brightness you need depending on your environment. To turn this on, tap ‘Settings’, then ‘General’, and ‘Accessibility’. From here, tap ‘Display Accommodations’ and toggle on the ‘Auto-Brightness’ option.
Software Updates
Another important point to be aware of when extending your iPad’s battery life is making sure your software is up to date. You can check this by going to ‘Settings’, then ‘General’, and selecting ‘Software Update’.
Here you can see if a new update is available, and also allow your iPad to automatically update when a new version of the software is released.
Staying up to date with the latest software is important because Apple’s engineers create better battery-saving technology with each update they introduce. Also, some features such as low-battery mode are only available with the latest iPad updates.
Reset iPad
Battery life slowly decreasing is of course not as big an issue as getting your iPad wet. However, there might come a time when restoring your iPad to factory settings is the best option.
Resetting your iPad can sometimes give it a new lease of life – just make sure you have backed your tablet up before starting this!
To reset an iPad, hold down the power button and the home button at the same time. Keep doing this until the Apple icon appears on your screen. You can then follow the on-screen instructions to restore your apps and settings.
To reset an iPad Pro, hold down the power button and either of the volume buttons at the same time. Then follow the same instructions as above for resetting an iPad.
Now You Know How to Maximize Your iPad Battery Life
By following our Fruit Fixed top tips, you can now get the most out of your iPad battery life. If after implementing these changes you still find the battery drains quickly, it might be time to get a technician to check it out.
For more information about how we can help you repair your device, select your iPad model for more information.
