6 ms·

> This will likely feed into the “planned obsolescence” narrative. well, non-replaceable battery and all...

Retric 9y ago
You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores and independent retailers. https://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-battery-replacement-diy-or-hire-a-pro/ https://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-battery-replacement-diy-o... The issue IMO, is it's not obvious that the battery needs to be replaced and when. It's not holding charge > new battery is far more obvious than it's slow > new battery. Most people probably prefer a slow phone than one without charge however Apple should have some indication of what's going on.
- oceanghost 9y ago
  You really can't though. I had a phone with an awful battery-- it would shut off around 25% randomly. I brought it into Apple 3 times, it even had apple care-- and because the f*ing diagnostic suite identified the battery as good, they wouldn't replace it. They wouldn't even LET ME PAY FOR THE REPAIR.
  - fleitz 9y ago
    Smash your phone, pay for a new phone under apple care. Voila.
  - suryamp 9y ago
    > LET ME PAY FOR THE REPAIR. Then you would know that it is totally their fault and the liability would be on Apple to fix other people's devices.
  - schrodinger 9y ago
    Same here. I went to a 3rd party place and they replaced it cheaper anyway, with no problems.
  - riahi 9y ago
    Agreed. I've been in 3 times. Every time I want to just pay for the replacement; they won't even offer the battery replacement if the diagnostic utility says the phone is good. My phone randomly shuts down or rapidly loses battery once it is below 40%. It's even worse when it's cold.
    - kuceram 9y ago
      That's exactly what's happening to me as well. I think it shows a battery percentage based on (old) current voltage which dramatically decreases with low temperature, i.e. when you pull your phone from warm pocket in cold weather.
- synicalx 9y ago
  But it's not as cheap or easy as just popping the back of your phone and slipping in a new battery. Mind you, most flagship phones these days can't be refurbished in that way.
  - greglindahl 9y ago
    Have you tried the nearby "We repair iPhones" store? They can replace your battery for a lot less than a new phone.
- ekianjo 9y ago
  > You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores Or you know, Apple could make it easy for the user to replace the battery by themselves. But they chose not to.
  - CamperBob2 9y ago
    Know how I can tell you haven't designed any consumer products with a battery, replaceable or otherwise? This is the engineering equivalent of saying, "Why doesn't someone just go to the Middle East, sit down at a round table with with the Israelis and Palestinians and Sunnis and Shiites and rebels and Baathists and Saudis and ISIS members and refugees and all those other guys, and help them work out their differences peacefully?"
    - ekianjo 9y ago
      Thats besides the point. Is it possible to design phones that can be serviced in some ways by your users? the answer is clearly yes. Does Apple care about that? The answer is clearly no. They have been making designs that can't be easily opened for a long time now.
    - Karunamon 9y ago
      Let's not pretend that Apple's hand was forced here. This is the company that dreamed up a proprietary screw to keep people out of their phones and computers.
      - baddox 9y ago
        It sounds like you’re describing the pentalobe screw, but security screws have existed for decades. Torx created variants with rejection pins in the 1970s. One-way screws have probably been around much longer than that.
        Karunamon 9y ago
        And every single one of those had drivers you could buy in a pack with 50 other at Amazon for $10. They could have used any of them. And yet, they didn't. The world didn't need yet another security screw.
Devagamster 9y ago
I imagine most users would prefer their iphone to stay on for a reasonable period over being super zippy. And like the other commenters said, replacing the battery will fix the problem.
- Xorlev 9y ago
  This was the final straw for me to move to Android. My 6S was unusably slow with iOS11. I'd rather this be something _I_ can control. At the very least, the performance should improve if you plug in the phone, and it doesn't. Edit: other thing I remember is that when I upgraded iOS10 at one point my battery _stopped_ being reliable. I was getting the unexpected shutdowns at <50%. Another weird thing I had experienced: after every update, my battery percentage would be totally screwy. I'd burn from 100% -> 1% in no time, then sit at 1% for hours. Over charge cycles, it'd figure it out again, but that'd be reset every time I upgraded. Edit 2: looks like I angered the fans. This is simply my experience. My geekbench scores were awful, so I was certainly impacted by this issue. I thought I'd done something wrong until this news came out.
  - pen2l 9y ago
    Another anecdata: Last night, I finally succumbed to iOS11 (the only reason I did was that I wanted to enroll in Heart Study, for which your iphone device has to be iOS11). Indeed I had been pushing it away because I usually associate the word "upgrade" to device death when it comes to mobile devices. But wow... it did not screw my 6S up. In fact, I think it's faster and 'zippier' with this iOS11 upgrade.
    - nofilter 9y ago
      iPhone 7 user here and iOS 11 also made my device much, much faster.
  - turtlebits 9y ago
    My 6S+ was also literally unusable after the iOS11 update. 5 second hangs on some actions, jittery scrolling. It improved after a few weeks. Not sure if it was an .x update that fixed it, or maybe it needed time to reindex (?) but it's fine now.
derefr 9y ago
It's replaceable, just not as a DIY. Apple encourages people to take their phones into Apple stores/authorized dealers to get the battery replaced. (Also, the repair is free if the battery's capacity has declined to <80% while under warranty. If you pay for two-year AppleCare+ [$99], you've basically pre-paid for a free battery replacement [normally also $99] at the two-year mark, as long as you've used—abused?—your phone heavily enough to wear its battery down by then. So, Bad Life ProTip: if you have AppleCare, make sure to run your battery flat a lot to get its capacity down, so as to get your money's worth.)
- ramphastidae 9y ago
  > If you buy 3-year AppleCare, you're effectively pre-paying for at least one battery top-up.) Unless I'm missing something, AppleCare on new iPhones is limited to two years ... which, in my experience, is just shortly before iPhone batteries degrade noticeably.
  - tolien 9y ago
    The AppleCare itself lasts two years, but that’s in addition to the year you get by default. The two don’t run concurrently. Edit: no, they do run concurrently. See child post. GP’s edited the reference to 3 years anyway.
    - ramphastidae 9y ago
      Curious if you have a source on that? I see otherwise here: https://www.apple.com/support/products/iphone.html https://www.apple.com/support/products/iphone.html I bought a new iPhone about 48 hours ago and was told the same thing as shown above.
      - tolien 9y ago
        Hmm, you’re right. I think my confusion was that Mac AppleCare used to be advertised as an additional 2 years (you could buy it as your standard warranty expired) but it’s now advertised as 3 years from device purchase too. Wonder when that changed…
_d8fd 9y ago
After having retired a couple of phones due to crappy battery life, my most recent phone purchase has a removable battery. I'll probably buy a new battery in ~4 months, when the phone is a year old. I'm happy I decided to follow that path, because I really like the phone (LG G5), and a replacement battery is less than $20 USD.

You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores and independent retailers. https://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-battery-replacement-diy-or-hire-a-pro/ https://www.cnet.com/how-to/iphone-battery-replacement-diy-o... The issue IMO, is it's not obvious that the battery needs to be replaced and when. It's not holding charge > new battery is far more obvious than it's slow > new battery. Most people probably prefer a slow phone than one without charge however Apple should have some indication of what's going on.

oceanghost 9y ago
You really can't though. I had a phone with an awful battery-- it would shut off around 25% randomly. I brought it into Apple 3 times, it even had apple care-- and because the f*ing diagnostic suite identified the battery as good, they wouldn't replace it. They wouldn't even LET ME PAY FOR THE REPAIR.
- fleitz 9y ago
  Smash your phone, pay for a new phone under apple care. Voila.
- suryamp 9y ago
  > LET ME PAY FOR THE REPAIR. Then you would know that it is totally their fault and the liability would be on Apple to fix other people's devices.
- schrodinger 9y ago
  Same here. I went to a 3rd party place and they replaced it cheaper anyway, with no problems.
- riahi 9y ago
  Agreed. I've been in 3 times. Every time I want to just pay for the replacement; they won't even offer the battery replacement if the diagnostic utility says the phone is good. My phone randomly shuts down or rapidly loses battery once it is below 40%. It's even worse when it's cold.
  - kuceram 9y ago
    That's exactly what's happening to me as well. I think it shows a battery percentage based on (old) current voltage which dramatically decreases with low temperature, i.e. when you pull your phone from warm pocket in cold weather.
synicalx 9y ago
But it's not as cheap or easy as just popping the back of your phone and slipping in a new battery. Mind you, most flagship phones these days can't be refurbished in that way.
- greglindahl 9y ago
  Have you tried the nearby "We repair iPhones" store? They can replace your battery for a lot less than a new phone.
ekianjo 9y ago
> You can replace the batteries at both Apple stores Or you know, Apple could make it easy for the user to replace the battery by themselves. But they chose not to.
- CamperBob2 9y ago
  Know how I can tell you haven't designed any consumer products with a battery, replaceable or otherwise? This is the engineering equivalent of saying, "Why doesn't someone just go to the Middle East, sit down at a round table with with the Israelis and Palestinians and Sunnis and Shiites and rebels and Baathists and Saudis and ISIS members and refugees and all those other guys, and help them work out their differences peacefully?"
  - ekianjo 9y ago
    Thats besides the point. Is it possible to design phones that can be serviced in some ways by your users? the answer is clearly yes. Does Apple care about that? The answer is clearly no. They have been making designs that can't be easily opened for a long time now.
  - Karunamon 9y ago
    Let's not pretend that Apple's hand was forced here. This is the company that dreamed up a proprietary screw to keep people out of their phones and computers.
    - baddox 9y ago
      It sounds like you’re describing the pentalobe screw, but security screws have existed for decades. Torx created variants with rejection pins in the 1970s. One-way screws have probably been around much longer than that.
      - Karunamon 9y ago
        And every single one of those had drivers you could buy in a pack with 50 other at Amazon for $10. They could have used any of them. And yet, they didn't. The world didn't need yet another security screw.

Devagamster 9y ago

I imagine most users would prefer their iphone to stay on for a reasonable period over being super zippy. And like the other commenters said, replacing the battery will fix the problem.

Xorlev 9y ago
This was the final straw for me to move to Android. My 6S was unusably slow with iOS11. I'd rather this be something _I_ can control. At the very least, the performance should improve if you plug in the phone, and it doesn't. Edit: other thing I remember is that when I upgraded iOS10 at one point my battery _stopped_ being reliable. I was getting the unexpected shutdowns at <50%. Another weird thing I had experienced: after every update, my battery percentage would be totally screwy. I'd burn from 100% -> 1% in no time, then sit at 1% for hours. Over charge cycles, it'd figure it out again, but that'd be reset every time I upgraded. Edit 2: looks like I angered the fans. This is simply my experience. My geekbench scores were awful, so I was certainly impacted by this issue. I thought I'd done something wrong until this news came out.
- pen2l 9y ago
  Another anecdata: Last night, I finally succumbed to iOS11 (the only reason I did was that I wanted to enroll in Heart Study, for which your iphone device has to be iOS11). Indeed I had been pushing it away because I usually associate the word "upgrade" to device death when it comes to mobile devices. But wow... it did not screw my 6S up. In fact, I think it's faster and 'zippier' with this iOS11 upgrade.
  - nofilter 9y ago
    iPhone 7 user here and iOS 11 also made my device much, much faster.
- turtlebits 9y ago
  My 6S+ was also literally unusable after the iOS11 update. 5 second hangs on some actions, jittery scrolling. It improved after a few weeks. Not sure if it was an .x update that fixed it, or maybe it needed time to reindex (?) but it's fine now.

derefr 9y ago

It's replaceable, just not as a DIY. Apple encourages people to take their phones into Apple stores/authorized dealers to get the battery replaced. (Also, the repair is free if the battery's capacity has declined to <80% while under warranty. If you pay for two-year AppleCare+ [$99], you've basically pre-paid for a free battery replacement [normally also $99] at the two-year mark, as long as you've used—abused?—your phone heavily enough to wear its battery down by then. So, Bad Life ProTip: if you have AppleCare, make sure to run your battery flat a lot to get its capacity down, so as to get your money's worth.)

ramphastidae 9y ago
> If you buy 3-year AppleCare, you're effectively pre-paying for at least one battery top-up.) Unless I'm missing something, AppleCare on new iPhones is limited to two years ... which, in my experience, is just shortly before iPhone batteries degrade noticeably.
- tolien 9y ago
  The AppleCare itself lasts two years, but that’s in addition to the year you get by default. The two don’t run concurrently. Edit: no, they do run concurrently. See child post. GP’s edited the reference to 3 years anyway.
  - ramphastidae 9y ago
    Curious if you have a source on that? I see otherwise here: https://www.apple.com/support/products/iphone.html https://www.apple.com/support/products/iphone.html I bought a new iPhone about 48 hours ago and was told the same thing as shown above.
    - tolien 9y ago
      Hmm, you’re right. I think my confusion was that Mac AppleCare used to be advertised as an additional 2 years (you could buy it as your standard warranty expired) but it’s now advertised as 3 years from device purchase too. Wonder when that changed…

_d8fd 9y ago

After having retired a couple of phones due to crappy battery life, my most recent phone purchase has a removable battery. I'll probably buy a new battery in ~4 months, when the phone is a year old. I'm happy I decided to follow that path, because I really like the phone (LG G5), and a replacement battery is less than $20 USD.