Two weeks ago, I went to an Apple Store and had a new battery put in my iPhone 6S. The very next day, I realized how unusable my old battery had been making my phone.
The repair restored functionality that had been seeping away so slowly I hadn’t really registered the loss. Apps now load when I tap them, not when they feel like it. The keyboard doesn’t freeze when I try to reply to emails in Outlook. My phone no longer clings to its charging cable like it’s a hospital drip, and the battery itself has stopped taking surprise nosedives from 40 percent charge down to zero when I have the temerity to go outside in the cold. (Yes, cold weather kills batteries.) The trust is back in my relationship with my phone, but as a result, I trust Apple a lot less.
The only reason I got the replacement was because of the debacle last December when a developer discovered that iOS upgrades were slowing down old iPhones. It seemed to confirm the persistent rumor that Apple throttles outdated handsets to force users to upgrade. The company’s PR department, stung into action by the bad press, said that Apple had been slowing down devices, but only to save them from their own worn-out batteries.
Apple explained that wear and tear on components meant it had to choose between giving old iPhones lower performance and more stability (by stopping unexpected shutdowns caused by degraded batteries), or the same performance and less stability. It opted for the former, but without telling customers what it was doing. Cue the outrage and Apple’s apology: cut-price battery replacements and a software update that lets users choose between performance and stability.
It’s a good way to say sorry, yes, but it also shows how badly Apple has been treating its customers — and how it can do better.
Before I got my new battery, I was planning to upgrade my iPhone this year. Now I’ll wait until at least 2019. The $30 replacement fee saved me hundreds of dollars and stopped environmental waste, so why didn’t Apple tell me about it sooner? I pay for AppleCare, which is supposed to help preserve my phone, but the option to replace its battery was never mentioned to me before December, and definitely not when I’ve gone to upgrade old iPhones in the past.
If you’re reading this and thinking, “You idiot, why would it tell you?” Well, you’re right. I know companies aren’t my friends and that no major smartphone manufacturer makes performance-saving repairs part of their sales pitch. Most of the industry runs on slim margins and high sales volume, so they need you to upgrade. Apple’s omission isn’t a surprise.
But that doesn’t mean it’s not bad, especially for a company that makes a huge profit on each phone it sells; that touts its green credentials whenever it can (Apple’s latest ads claim the iPhone is “zero waste”); and that prides itself on customer satisfaction. As the company said in its apology note: “We’ve always wanted our customers to be able to use their iPhones for as long as possible.” So why not make repairs easier?
Again, you can laugh at me for being naive. But what do you have to lose by at least being angry about this and demanding change? Do you really think Apple deserves more of your money?
Apple’s response to customers’ annoyance has been laudable for the industry, but it also shows it could be encouraged to do more. Smartphone technology has plateaued, and the trend is for us to hang on to our phones longer. This means repairs and replacements are going to become increasingly worthwhile. Apple should be more upfront in telling its customers what they can do to keep their current handset alive, rather than only pushing them toward an upgrade. This is a company that claims it always has its users’ best interests at heart, so why not prove it? It’s allowed users to turn off throttling in older phones and introduced battery service warnings, but December’s outrage shows this isn’t enough, and the company’s battles against the “right to repair” movement are the opposite of helpful.
Changes to how Apple advertises battery replacements would encourage us to think about our smartphones differently. Not as disposable items (an approach that’s causing huge environmental damage) but as something closer to a car: a useful object that can and should be maintained. When it announced its battery replacement scheme last December, Apple said it wanted to “regain the trust of anyone who may have doubted Apple’s intentions.” I think there’s more it can do.
Comments
I don’t think you’re naive. How could anyone know, before the reveal that iOS throttles phones with old batteries? The people who suspected this happened were called conspiracy theorists!
I really don’t know what the best all-around solution is. Battery degradation is physics. But man, I see how slow my girlfriend’s iPhone 6s is now, and how quickly the charge drains. That phone was amazing when it was new. It’s hard to believe how quickly it throttles, degrades.
I think the changes in iOS 11.3 are a step in the right direction, as well as the battery replacement discount Apple is running. But I hope Apple can come up with a better solution so the degradation doesn’t happen so quickly, and the fix is simpler. It’s not that simply to replace half a billion iPhone batteries, I suspect. What about people who don’t live near Apple stores?
Complicated!
By JeffWPa on 03.01.18 8:15am
Again, sounds more like your girlfriend has an OS issue, not a battery one. I’d try a restore and I’m sure most issues will be cleared. Battery throttling is hardly noticeable when in action. If the entire experience is slowed down, it’s most likely not to do with the battery
By jonnikuest1 on 03.01.18 8:39am
I wouldn’t be surprised. You know how you look at how someone uses their phone and wonder why they suffer? That’s how I feel with her. Icons and folders haphazard all over. No priority to most-used apps on the main screen, etc.
Good news with iOS 11.3 is she will be able to see how the battery health is holding up, and then make the decision about whether to wipe and start over or get a new battery.
By JeffWPa on 03.01.18 9:04am
lol
Understood. I don’t think she’ll even need To start over. I’ve seen a lot of people with issues since iOS 11, just do a regular restore and recovery and things return back to stable. That should be less of a headache
By jonnikuest1 on 03.01.18 9:10am
Flashbacks to Windows 95. OS running slow? Just reinstall!
What year is it?
By endemic on 03.01.18 9:27am
I mean, this is all they were doing at Apple stores before this story blew up.
By Stone Cold Dan Quinn on 03.01.18 10:18am
Well this has been the answer for the inevitable Android lag for the past decade.
By Big Macs on 03.01.18 2:04pm
I’ve not seen android ‘lag’ that I needed to reset my phone for since I had my Galaxy S3 what, 5-6 years ago?
That was before TRIM got added to baseline android in jellybean.
By UtopiaNH on 03.01.18 5:54pm
My mom’s old GS5 was barely usable before I gave her my 7.
By VisionaryShaolin on 03.17.18 11:10am
It’s 2018 and that’s never stopped being a thing for Windows.
By Wizerud on 03.01.18 4:04pm
I haven’t encountered a need to regain performance with a reinstall of OS since Windows XP. The problem never surfaced on Windows 7 and beyond. You can try googling – reinstalling/refreshing the OS isn’t a common thing for Windows for a long, long time. Even on Windows Phone.
By Vasp on 03.01.18 6:33pm
I work in an enterprise environment and it’s absolutely a thing all of the time.
By Wizerud on 03.02.18 1:16pm
If your machines are abused perhaps. That does not take anything away from Vasp’s statement.
Windows itself is solid, and has been since late XP.
By Jes Conradsen on 03.06.18 4:59pm
Disagree. His description of the problem sounds almost exactly like a throttled battery.
I think a lot of people dramatically underestimate how much a throttled battery can affect performance. Apple has stated, on the record, that a throttled battery reduces the current available to the processor when it spins up to try to do something. Mobile processors are bursty by nature, and can spin up and down many times in a minute of use. Launching apps, unlocking the phone, using spotlight, switching camera modes, and a hundred other things people do routinely will cause the processor to tax a worn battery and cause noticeable lag.
By CricTic on 03.01.18 1:20pm
Wasn’t this whole article based on the opposite thought? He didn’t mention reloading his OS.
By davidcmal on 03.01.18 2:18pm
Both explanations are plausible.
I had an aged iPhone 6S performing poorly. Used restore function, and removed apps on top of this. Saw little performance gain. Then replaced battery, and performance is restored.
The restore was previously helpful as a troubleshooting step, but the OS now gives you a read on battery health.
By zeemotiq on 03.01.18 4:02pm
Performance hits can have different causes is the point.
By VisionaryShaolin on 03.17.18 11:13am
Restoring your phone is not something "you just try" – doing that means data loss, since there is no way to know which apps have flagged their data as being included or excluded from the backup.
When my girlfriend’s phone was dying at 40% charge early last year, we took it to an Apple store for a new battery. They tested the battery, told us it was in perfect condition and refused to replace it. Then they suggested a factory reset.
We didn’t reset the phone, we bought a new phone since that is preferable (you can verify your important data has been copied to the new phone before erasing the old one).
Like the author of this article, my trust in Apple has also been shattered. They refused to repair our phone even though it was clearly a hardware issue and we were happy to pay for it.
By abhibeckert on 03.01.18 4:20pm
Hope you don’t blame it too much on the staff. This really sounds like it was company policy.
By HeadPack on 03.02.18 2:22am
This is not a problem. Apps default to store their data in iCloud during backups unless you turn them off. If apps don’t support that function then they’re typically apps you log into, which then restores app data. You didn’t mention any data loss after upgrading her phone.
Why didn’t you just do the restore? You could’ve potentially saved her/yourself hundreds of dollars.
By VisionaryShaolin on 03.17.18 11:34am
It may be a physics issue but it only applies to a certain models – they have recently found a solution on the newer hardware.
By pboardman on 03.01.18 8:41am
Apple’s statement:
It’s unclear what they mean exactly. My guess is the battery degrades just as fast, but the consequences of degradation aren’t as bad, because they somehow have ways of preventing shutdowns that don’t involve permanently throttling the phone. Perhaps it’s still some kind of throttling, just one that doesn’t significantly impact real-world speed.
By p_giguere1 on 03.01.18 11:59am
I find it interesting/odd that the iPhone is their last product on a 500 charge cycle rating, most newer products have 1000. Some blame the size, but the tiny Apple Watch battery even has a 1000 charge cycle rating, that up to the biggest rMBP.
https://www.apple.com/ca/batteries/service-and-recycling/
If iPhones had those 1000 cycle ratings, I think /most/ people would be more content with their life before the throttling kicks in.
By tipoo on 03.01.18 8:54am
This doesn’t seem to be related to that number. I have seen phones experiencing unexpected shutdowns after only 200 or so cycles.
It’s possible the reason phones last fewer cycles is because the usage pattern is different – unlike a Mac or Watch they are likely to spend a significant portion of their life under 50% charge, which hurts the battery and reduces its life.
By abhibeckert on 03.01.18 4:26pm
Nice post, Jeff (impressed!)
In the equation is of course:
Importantly built in to the power delivery of the phone it can be made with too little wiggle room (tolerances too little for worn batteries). I suspect this is a mistake that Apple among other have made in this instance with their designs.
By Jes Conradsen on 03.01.18 9:08am