What Next

• If you can live without the app then the best thing to do is delete the app.
• While iOS takes care of suspending apps in the background, it’s likely that some apps wake up in the background to fetch content off the network. You may want to force close apps like VoIP, navigation, and streaming audio apps if you’re not using them as they’re known to drain battery life. It is important to note here that you should only close apps that you don’t want to use. It is not a good practice to force close all apps, as that could have an adverse impact on battery life.
• If you want to use the app, then you should seriously consider disabling Location Services (Settings > Privacy > Location Services) and Background app refresh (Settings > General > Background App Refresh) features for the app as they can end up consuming battery life. We will cover it in more detail next.

3. Disable Location Services

You should also disable the Precise Location option that some apps may ask for. If you’ve accidentally disabled location services for an app that needs to use it, don’t worry, it will prompt you to give access to Location Services when you launch it.

4. Disable Background App Refresh

iOS includes smarter multi tasking that lets apps fetch content in the background. Although Apple has a lot of optimizations in place to ensure that battery consumption is minimal, it’s possible that a poorly developed app could be using this feature incorrectly which could end up draining your iPhone’s battery life.

To disable Background App Refresh go to Settings > General > Background App Refresh and turn it off for apps like Facebook or other apps that don’t absolutely need to be updated all the time. Background App Refresh is a great feature for apps like OneDrive or Google Photos where you need to upload media in the background, but you don’t need it for every app.

I would strongly recommend turning it off for the Facebook app as it is known to drain battery life.

You have the option to enable Background App Refresh only when you’re on a Wi-Fi network. You could see if selecting just Wi-Fi reduces the battery drain on your iPhone or you may want to turn off completely. It will also help in saving mobile data on your iPhone.

5. Use Dark Mode

Last year, Apple integrated a system-wide dark mode with the iOS 13 update. It stretches from the dynamic wallpaper to the widgets screen to the Settings screen and apps that have added support for Dark mode. It should help in improving battery life on iPhones with an OLED display like the iPhone 11 Pro, iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone X.

 

Simply go to the Control Center, press on the Brightness slider, and then tap on the Appearance button to switch between the Light and the Dark mode.

 

You can set the dark mode on a schedule as well. Go to Settings -> Display and Brightness and turn on the Automatic option. Then tap on Settings to switch to a custom schedule. By default, the dark mode will turn on automatically after sunset. You can check our article to learn how to enable Dark mode on your iPhone or iPad.

 

6. Use Low Power Mode

If your device is running low on battery, and you still have some time to get to a power source, then you could enable the all-new Low Power mode by going to Settings > Battery and tapping on the toggle. Low Power Mode temporarily reduces power consumption by turning off or reducing mail fetch, background app refresh, automatic downloads, and some visual effects. Apple states that the Low Power Mode mode can improve battery life by an additional 3 hours.

You will also get a prompt to enable Low Power Mode when you hit 20% battery remaining, and will automatically disable it when battery remaining crosses 80%.

7. Place iPhone Facedown

iOS includes a facedown detection feature, which makes use of the ambient light sensor to ensure the display doesn’t light up when you receive a Notification when you place the iPhone facedown. The feature along with other refinements helps in increasing battery life by an additional hour as it turns off the display when not in use. So when you place your iPhone on the table, you should place it facedown to conserve battery life. Please note the Facedown Detection feature is available only on iPhone 5s or later devices.

 

8. Turn Off Raise to Wake

The Raise to Wake feature automatically turns on the screen of your iPhone every time you pick it up and it’s facing towards you. This is very useful if you want to wake your iPhone just to check the received notification or the time. Rather than using the Home button, you can simply pick up your device to turn on the display.

 

It is useful, but it also can drain battery life if you have the iPhone in your hand while walking, jogging, dancing, or otherwise moving around while the feature is activating itself frequently. Turn it off to save some battery life by navigating to Settings > Display & Brightness > Raise to Wake > Toggle Off.

 

Once Raise to Wake is disabled, the iPhone will no longer turn the screen on itself just by an upward motion alone.

9. General Tips

Please note that the tips under section are to highlight areas where you could disable things that are not applicable to you so you can extend battery life. We are not recommending or advising you to disable features just for battery life, as then there would be no point in using smartphones like the iPhone.

i. Widgets

Widgets get a major makeover with the iOS 14 update. You can finally add resizable widgets on the home screen as well. However, you shouldn’t go overboard with them on the iPhone. You should review the widget list and remove the widgets that you don’t want to ensure they don’t consume battery life unnecessarily as some of them could be using Location services.

ii. Turn off Dynamic Wallpapers

Dynamic wallpapers bring subtle animations to the home and the lock screen. Unfortunately, the animations take up CPU cycles and consume more battery. So if you have set a dynamic wallpaper, and you’re having battery issues, go to Settings > Wallpaper > Choose Wallpaper where you can go to either Stills or your set an image from your photo library as your wallpaper.

iPhone 6s or later also allows you to set Live Photos as wallpapers, but it should have an impact on battery life as they come to life only when you use 3D Touch to firmly press on the wallpaper.

iv. Other tips

If you hardly use Bluetooth then turn it off (Settings -> General -> Bluetooth)

Set Auto-Lock interval so that your iPhone will turn off more quickly after a period of inactivity. To set the Auto-Lock interval, navigate to Settings > Display & Brightness > Auto-Lock and set the auto-lock interval to either 30 seconds, 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 minutes.

You’re probably aware that using Wi-Fi drains iPhone’s battery, but perhaps you didn’t know that one of the most intensive processes that iPhone’s Wi-Fi chip has to do is search for the available network. So if this happens at regular intervals, it’s going to have a noticeable impact on your battery. To disable this feature, launch the Settings app, tap on Wi-Fi, and tap on the On/Off toggle for Ask to Join Networks to disable it.

Dimming the screen helps to increase battery life. You can either lower the default screen brightness based on your preference or turn on Auto-Brightness to allow the screen to adjust its brightness based on current lighting conditions. Launch the Settings app, scroll down and tap on Brightness & Wallpaper, and set Auto-Brightness to On.

10. Troubleshooting Tips

i. Hard Reset Your iPhone

Like all tech problems, there is no harm in force restarting or hard resetting your iPhone to see if it helps with iOS 14 battery life.

On an iPhone 11 series, iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR, iPhone X, iPhone 8, and iPhone 8 Plus, press and quickly release the Volume Up button. Press and quickly release the Volume Down button. Then press and hold the Side button until you see the Apple logo.

On an iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus, press and hold both the Side and Volume Down buttons for at least 10 seconds, until you see the Apple logo.

On an iPhone 6s and earlier, iPad, or iPod touch; press and hold both the Home and the Top (or Side) buttons for at least 10 seconds, until you see the Apple logo.

ii. Resetting Network Settings

Reset network settings by tapping Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings. This will reset all network settings, including passwords, VPN, and APN settings.

Source: https://www.iphonehacks.com/2020/09/ios-14-how-improve-iphone-battery-life.html