Apple announces Smart Battery Case, adds up to 25 hours of talk time to iPhone 6s

By Rich Edmonds
last updated

Apple has just announced the company's first power extender—the Smart Battery Case for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6s. It's available in both black and white silicone and promises up to 18 hours of extra LTE browsing or 20 hours or extra video playback. There's not yet an option for Plus owners of either generation.

The Smart Battery Case charges via built-in Lightning port, and if you have the case on your iPhone, you can charge both at the same time. It also means other Lightning accessories work even with the case on, including the Lightning Dock.

Since Apple controls the entire ecosystem, the company can offer extra functionality as well—charging level for both the case and the iPhone is shown right on the Lock screen.

The Smart Battery Case is available now. Check it out and let us know what you think of it!

$99 from the Apple Store (opens in new tab)

The Smart Battery Case is engineered specifically for iPhone 6s and iPhone 6 to give you even longer battery life and protection. The soft microfiber lining on the inside helps protect your iPhone, while the soft elastomer hinge design makes it easy to put the case on and take it off again. On the outside, the silky, soft-touch finish of the silicone exterior feels great in your hand.

Charge your iPhone and battery case simultaneously for increased talk time up to 25 hours, Internet use up to 18 hours on LTE, and even longer audio and video playback.* With the Smart Battery Case on, the intelligent battery status is displayed on the iPhone Lock screen and in Notification Center, so you know exactly how much charge you have left.

The battery case supports Lightning accessories, such as the Lightning to USB Cable (included with your iPhone) and works with the iPhone Lightning Dock (sold separately). Choose from two complementary colors.

Via: TechCrunch

Rich Edmonds
Rich Edmonds
52 Comments
  • This has got to be the most unapple-like accessory I've ever seen. Other battery packs make the width uniform across the case. Apple is constantly talking about thin thin thin, and cramming every inch of battery into the thinnest space possible, why make a weird bump?
  • Yes, struck me as weird as well. Even if the battery is only in that part why round it off so sudden, use the rest of the back to smooth it out. Basically, shape it like the original iPhone. Oh well, at least this shows they know people think battery is an issue, maybe they'll think twice about making the next version any thinner.
  • I think the bump falls right into the cup of your hand if you hold the iPhone, with maybe your index finger just next to the bump on the back of the phone. Depending on how you hold it. And the same for landscape, they left room at the bottom and top so you can hold it more easily in landscape mode without feeling the bump of the extra battery.
  • I agree. Between this and the Apple Watch charging base it seems the Apple accessory design department is phoning it in. And I don't buy that the intention is to make it easier to hold, since every Apple product (until this) prioritizes sleekness over grip.
  • It's the same with the recent iMacs. Thin on the edges, fat center.
  • Good, innovative design pretty much always "shocks" at first sight. That's how you know it's good. It looks "ugly" because it looks *different* from anything you'd expect, because this is how innovation works. If it's innovative, it's different. The design is proven by it's utility and use. The real test will be how it looks to people a month from now or a year from now and how many people adopt it over other choices. I would bet this will be a really successful product and widely used. I would bet that the "bump" style will actually be copied and you will see Morphie or some other manufacturer release a case like this soon as well.
  • You're probably right about it starting a new fashion trend, but ugh, I don't like it. If they had smoothed down the bump and made the device shaped like the iPhone 3G/3GS I think it would look better and feel better in the hand.
  • What a load of hand-wavy trolling crap ;)
  • You might be right Gazoobee, but I don't think so. Two words: Pontiac Aztec. Posted via the Android iMore App!
  • I think people can tell between ugly and innovative.
  • I think that battery hump on the back will not be comfortable in the hand. I would stick with the Mophie instead. Posted via the iMore App for Android
  • OK apple. What is the size of the battery in mah? I don't understand why they always omit that. I would like to compare it to my current case because the lightning port for charging is definitely an upgrade. Sent from the iMore App
  • The price is insane. Like everything from Apple but this is too much.. Design is not bad.
  • Call it insane if you want to, but it's pretty in line with similar offerings from Mophie and other accessory makers.
  • They don't mention the size of the battery.. If it's half the size of Mophie they shouldn't be at the same price range.
  • Sorry, what? Did you say ‘Design is not bad’?
  • Based on the quoted hours, it sounds like it's significantly less than the Mophie. You have to take a few things into account though:
    1) The Lightning port is still available to use, so you don't have to have a separate Micro USB charging cable around to charge the case and the phone.
    2) It's from Apple, and is fully integrated into iOS. The OS shows the charge level of the case as well. Also, being Apple brand automatically tacks a few extra bucks on to the price (for better or worse). Having said those two things, I think that $79 or $89 would have been a better pricepoint for this unit. It's fugly with that hump in the back, there is no option to switch from phone battery to case battery (it just happens automatically), and the capacity is much less than what similar cases offer.
  • People are saying it's 68% of a Morphie Juice Pack. Don't know if that's accurate, but I've read that in multiple places.
  • "slight hump"
    That's pretty funny.
  • just imagine with me that Samsung made this case. for 5 seconds just IMAGINE the thinkpieces we would be reading. this site wrote 7 or 8 paragraphs about a misaligned headphone jack. amazing.
  • I totally agree Samsung would get destroyed on Imore if they made this Frankenstein of a thing. Sent from the iMore App
  • Agreed. This site will let a monstrosity like this skate by, but of course they go out of their way to point out a headphone jack a mm or 2 off center. Ridiculous. This thing looks ugly and uncomfortable. Posted via the iMore App for Android
  • I think the design will be easier to use than if the entire case were thickened with a rounded back side, as most other battery cases are made. You won't really feel the hump. At least not the way I hold the phone. It looks odd though.
  • This has to be a joke. It's f**king ugly. Sent from the iMore App
  • Looks like a tumorous growth on the back of the phone. Flashback to Nokia Lumia 1020 camera hump.
  • At least Lumia 1020 is beautiful. Sent from the iMore App
  • This is one of the ugliest things I've seen Apple design in a long time. Apple always puts looks over function. What happened here? Sent from the iMore App
  • Apple does *not* ... "put looks (form) over function." To do so would be classic *bad* design and most of the designers at Apple actually went to design school.
  • You jest of course.
  • No I don't. Anyone who has even been to design school would know that putting form over function is bad design. The statement is a terrible canard that's generally raised by people who actually know nothing about design. In a good design, form and function are one. That's the goal.
    If either supersedes or dominates the other then it's quite literally, a "bad design." It's an indisputable fact that Apple has the best design chops of any company in it's field. Ipso facto, if someone accuses them of always putting form before function, then they don't know much about design, and are basically just trying to sound smart.
  • Basically, you believe Apple is infallible.
  • That's not even in the general ballpark of what I said or the topic at hand. I certainly don't feel that Apple is infallible. The new Apple TV is a steaming pile of human waste for example that I wouldn't recommend anyone waste their money on. . You can't just ignore that they are, and have been for a long while, at the top of the heap when it comes to hardware design though. Also, I've been to design school. This is all stuff you could look up on the Internet or that would be told to you in "Design 101" at your local University or Polytechnic.
  • In this case, Apple did put looks (ugly) over function (battery capacity). Posted via the Android iMore App!
  • But hey... At least the camera doesn't stick out any more.
  • You’re choosing between having your right arm cut off or your left arm cut off.
  • Going against the grain here. I actually kind of like the look of this. Doesn't make much practical sense to me though. Would rather just get a Plus model with that extra hundred bucks. They'd both be equally unwieldy, but at least I'd get the bigger screen and better low-light photos with a Plus.
  • I still might try one though. It doesn't look great but it seems integrated pretty well with iphone.
  • Probably better off with an Anker. But to each their own
  • Only that I know it's almost Christmas I would have checked it wasn't April 1st. ******* hideous looking. Sent from the iMore App
  • At first glance it doesnt look like a good design. I just picked one up at the local store here in NYC and I love the case. It is thin and very well integrated into iOS. The battery design allows it to work with all the charging docks including apples own dock. It is very comfortable to hold as well.
  • The best things about this case is the lightning port (I HATE micro USB!) and the iOS integration. The worst part about this case is this extra battery material should be INSIDE the iPhone. Please Apple ease up a bit on the obsession with thinness and next Fall give us an iPhone 7 that will actually get through a solid day on one charge.
  • The big plus is you get to use the Lightning connection still. I love what Mophie dies but that USB charging port ruined it for me. Sent from the iMore App
  • I think the iPhone 6s is too big to consider a battery case. I've only ever had one for the iPhone 4s and even then it added too much bulk. If I were going to have a phone that big, I spend the extra money and have the 6s Plus, my wife has one and the battery life is awesome. Sent from the iMore App
  • I'd love to see a Jony Ive promotional video for this thing!
  • My big complaint about the aesthetics of this thing is the same for all of Apple's cases since the design of it is essentially identical to the silicone rubber cases they sell for all iPhones and all iPads. If you want a WHITE one (the most popular colour), you have to deal with the GIANT BLACK Apple logo on the back. You literally have to walk around like an advert for Apple. You might as well buy a red Coca-Cola T-Shirt to go with it and wear Nike shoes, etc. All the other case colours they offer have a very SUBTLE "colour on colour" Apple logo that doesn't stand out at all, but for some reason, if you want WHITE, Apple wants you to have a giant, jet-black logo on the back that can be seen from space. No options, no arguments. If you want white, you are agreeing to being a walking billboard. I don't get why that is. Why not make them the same as the other colours? While I'm on the subject, why doesn't Apple ever make purple accessories? What do they have against purple? They generally do yellow, red, blue, green, & orange. All the primaries, and all of the secondaries, *except* ... purple. WTF?
  • Basically no incentive to improve battery life in the phone itself now. If they make an extra 40 points off the case, they will continue to place limited life in phones to push people to need the case.
  • Yikes and Yuck! They need to take that thing off the market and start from scratch! lol
  • A total money grab. As some have suggested, it's clear Apple knows about the 6/6s battery issues and came up with this "solution" to the problem. I love Apple products, but I'd never buy this case.
  • So very iMore-ish not commenting the design because it's clearly not very good looking
  • I absolutely love the way it doesn't add bulk to the iPhone the way other battery cases do. It's slick, light, easy to put on, comfortable to hold and won't feel like a brick in a pocket, Apple nailed it this time. Sent from the iMore App
  • Someone out there knows if it works with CarPlay? Because microusb cases doesn’t work . Can someone PLZZZZ let me know ! Haven’t find any info, for 100$ I need to be very sure Sent from the iMore App
  • This place is very interesting, when a bad design product come up by Apple, people here will say "beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder". But when it is by Samsung, people here will say miss align, ugly, they didn't pay attention to the finest details and blah blah blah. This is so entertaining. And it is what makes me keep coming back here to read those funny article and comments.