How's Your Battery Life with iPhone 3.1?

Since latest SW update a couple days ago, batt life is WAY down, approx 25% what it was before the update. Apple how can this happen? Surely you must thoroughly test your releases...

all night charge using ac/usb cable. Max charge was only 99%. The phone show 25min of use but I dont think its correct, but from 6:15am to 1:00pm battery down to 20%. Typing this at 2pm and the phone is now dead, dead, dead. I have EVERYTHING turned off including 3g. Phone sure is pretty but no good if I cant use it.

Battery Life on my 3G 16mb is much worse since upgrading to 3.1.1 - even when most functionality is turned off.
Is it a problem with this particular model?
Unpredictable battery life and the battery often lasting only 3 - 4 hours makes my i-phone a toy not a business tool. Apple I am losing the faith - please get this problem sorted out !!!!

Was reading this disscussion using 3g for 45min on iPhone 3gs 16gb. Wifi is not on, push is off, Bluetooth is off. I am now on 91% (fullcharge when I started). Is this good or bad? 3.1 cane stick on this phone.
Thanks.

I got the 16 gig iPhone 3G S and the battery only seems to last a few hours on a full charge and its not hardly being used most of the time.

I came online to see if there was anything up... I'm suddenly down to only about 4 hours of life - without any actual usage. It just drains right out. HELP!!!!

Battery goes flat much quicker since i've installed OS 3.1
no doubts about it

My wife and I both have the 16GB iphones 3gs. Just as a note to hardware, we both also have macbook pro's. I'm not a fanboy, in fact I hated apple for 20 years, and was MS Certified with windows. I got so tired of fixing windows PC's and the bugs, spyware, key-loggers, virus's, firewall issues, wifi issues and the like, I could go on and on. When I finally purchased an iphone 3gs it was great! The OS runs much better than windows based phones, and is much less prone to an 'attack' from the outside world. I'm not trying to sell anybody, its just I see comments like 'welcome to MMS five years ago', (see above) and Im thinking, well at least when Apple dose 'catch up' they do right. The camera on the 3gs is a good example of this. I had a sony 7.2 pix that didn't take photos as good as the 3gs did. So, I gave the sony to my sister. Its too bad Apple is having this issue with 3.1, however you cant beat the fact that you have a nice piece of hardware compared to other phones, which have all their issues as well, even though Apple haters want you to think they dont, IMFO! So, to get to the point, I have 3.0.1 on mine, and she has 3.1. We BOTH had to do an exchange the first time we upgraded to 3.1, all of the problems you read here is why, see above. Bad battery life, shutting down, cant make calls etc... So on our second phones she upgraded with in a week of getting hers and Ive not see any issues so far. she's had 3.1 on there for a week. I had her delete half of her apps. The first night she put 3.1 on her 3gs it restarted and wouldn't start back up, we plugged it in (to the macbook) to charge, NOT THE WALL. I think there is a difference for some reason with USB charging vs the wall charger. Once we did that it turned back on in 10 mins. I Since that first night we haven't had any issues, in fact shes getting better battey life by 25%. I'm still running 3.0.1, I want to wait for a point update from 3.1 to ensure I don't have to mess with mine until then.

I got a 32GB 3gs about a month ago which had 3.0 on it. I was hesitant to update because of the issuses I've been hearing but yet my battery life seemed to suck anyway. So a couple of days ago I decided 'the hec with it' and updated; I'm still under warranty to if battery gets even worse I'll just get a replacement. Well since then battery has actually be excellent! Almost 13 hours of standby time 5 hours usage and still 48% to spare. This is with everything on (excluding Bluetooth) I also should not then when I installed it, I immediatly did a restore after completion

After upgrading to 3.1: I’ve noticed that there is a corelation between the fast battery drainage and the random inability to dial out, and these only happen after I use certain applications.

I updated it yesterday. I almost overslept this morning because the phone didn't activate the alarm. It didn't do that because the phone had completely discharged the battery overnight. I usually try to maximize battery life - push email only on demand, etc. - and can go a full day with no problems. The only thing I can conclude is that it was the update that did it. So I restored it to the factory settings.

I upgraded about a week ago (3G 8GB). My battery life is noticeably worse. I used to get a full "day" under normal use (7AM - 7PM). I get about half of that now. I will be rolling this back to 3.01 when I get a chance. 3.1 just has too many problems and restrictions.
I have no idea why people are so in love with Apple. If this was a Windows product, the Mac users of the world would be in full concert about how outdated and buggy it is. MMS texting in 2009?!?! Welcome to about 5 years ago...

I upgraded to the 3.1 software and didn't notice any battery changes. I'd even go a couple days without charging. But now it's all jacked up. I'll have it 100% charged. Then unplug it and a few minutes later it will shut off. When I try turning it back on it says it needs to be plugged in and charged up so I do so. And after about 5-10mins it finally turns back on and when I unplug it? Full battery!!! Even today I made sure to have it cometely charged before driving 5hrs back to school. And within 5 mins of leaveing the house it dies and then I plug it in 3 hours down the road to get a quick charge to tell my parents I'm almost home and after being plugged in for a few minutes the battery is fully charged again. It's like the battery indicator no longer matters and the point I'm which my phone will die is undetectable. I have the 3gs and like I said updated it when the mms release came out last week. Don't know what to do exept keep a charger on me just incase it acts up and I need a quick power boost to get it back on and back to normal.

I just purchased the iPhone 3GS. I've used Apple computers for 20 years and held off on the iPhone until a week ago. I'm still in the trial stages and surprisingly have better coverage with AT&T than Sprint?? Go figure because that's not the rep that AT&T had.
Anyhow, my phone shows Version 3.0.1, and I am assuming (and hope) that is different than the 3.1 being discussed. I will not be doing an upgrade until I see this thread calm down with solutions. In the meantime I have picked up good conservation advise with turning off location, push, and wifi when not needed. Incidentally, I was a Treo user for 5 years and tried the new Palm Pre from Sprint before jumping on the iPhone. I'm an Apple fan and hope and expect this battery issue to be resolved soon.

Today I detected a strange 'jump': Had about 90% Batteryload and some time later (do not know, how long exactly) it was down to 65%, though I hadn't used my iPhone at all, no telefone, no gaming, nothing. Well, that is kinda strange, isn't it?
iPhone 3GS 32GB, lots of apps on it; apart from this unnormal battery discharge it works pretty good, hadn't had any worse troubles at all every since.

I only had my first Iphone ( 3GS 3.1 OS) for a couple of days and noticed a sound issue when the battery reaches 20% capacity, I get no sound alerts for SMS or phone calls. Rebooting does not help. This is very annoying. Can you confirm this problem with 3.1, or is it just mine not functioning well!? Thanks

The solution that has worked for me:
-delete all email accounts; and
-switch off MMS.
Battery life has returned to normal (but with more up-time than before). Phone is no longer heating up.
Looking forward to update 3.1.1 to get the email back.

It happened again today. My Iphone 3.1 was fully charged when I laid it down. I reached for it - having not used it for about an hour. It felt warm and the batter was dead.

Yes, I have experience serious battery drainage even thou I'm on stanby mode, in every 2 to 4 minutes, the battery percentage drops by 1% even when I'm not using any apps, in fact I was just checking the time. Again and again, and I have realized it dropped again, time after time, this happened immediately I've updated to OS 3.1..
I hope APPLE will seriously look into this matter and quickly come up with a new OS version or something, that will fix all the bugs in 3.1
Thanks.

I've a non-jail-broken 2nd gen iPhone, and since the upgrade to 3.1 the battery life's gone from around 24 hours to 4 => 2 if I get calls. I've restored, checked to ensure I'm not running anything I shouldn't be, without any improvement.
I've really enjoyed the iPhone, but these last 2 days have been ridiculous. Really not happy.. Hopefully a fix comes soon.. Otherwise I'll need to start looking for an alterntive phone.

i had diminishing battery life...after searching for a fix, i tried draining my battery more than once and it did not work at all. i then restored my iphone to factory settings and had the option to start with a blank slate or update to the back up of your previous settings. IT WORKED!!! at last, my battery was back to normal!!!

Much worse - intermittently. I recharge every nite. Once or twice a week, I'll pick it up and it's completely dead.

Upgrade my iPhone 3G 16GB with 3.1 the battery's life is about 24 hrs. Previous version (3.0) was better, the battery's life was about 36 hrs

My battery life deteriorated significantly, but only after I did the MMS update on Saturday. Nothing else has changed. After a full charge and very minimal use (basically checking to see how fast the battery was draining), I drained the battery completely in approximately 5 hours. In contrast to that, after normal use in a full work day I typically would have a 55-60% charge. I put it back on the charger and the recharge seems to be considerably slower. A very disturbing development.

Battery life is much worse with 3.1. Am below 20% each evening with same usage and settings as before. My battery life has been cut in just about half of what it was with 3.0.

The 3.1 upgrade definitely caused a major problem with my battery life on my 3G 16GB. The battery lasts about an hour and it gets really warm now. Prior to upgrade I would get a full day of battery life. I tried the restore but it restored 3.1 back on my phone so, I have no improvement. I want to roll back to 3.0 or earlier, or get a fix from Apple.

In Regards to the battery of the iphone 3g s I have the 16GB and I purchased the phone new and it already had preinstalled 3.1 software and so far with normal usage I have been able to go 3 days on the battery. Although will be charging on the third day. Great phone and much improvement

Battery life with 3.1 is considerably worse.
I'm on a non-jailbroken 3G iphone.

My Battery life is very strange after upgrading to 3.1.
I unplugged it at 9am, used the web for 30 minutes on 3G, Bluetooth on, Push on... after 4 hours it reads 97%.
But the battery drain seems to speed up, the further the charge goes down.
Charge lasts less than a day.

Tom - YA YOU'RE COOL...

My battery life has been cut in half. I unplug it at 7:30 am and by 1:00 pm with moderade use (10-15) texts and zero calls, I get the 20% battery life remaining warning. This was NEVER an issue before 3.1. Never. I could last all day before I got that warning. I have the 16gb 3G.

ARTI: Instead of trying to look like a bad ass, why don't you read the question at hand.. the whole point of this topic is Did the battery life get worse in 3.1 compared to 3.0. So you compare your normal daily use using 3.0 to 3.1, and YES 3.1 has made my battery life cut in half.. I used to have to charge my phone every other night. I'm lucky to get it on a charger every night before it dies now. I have not changed the way or the amount that I use my phone. I had to buy a Kensington external battery just to be sure i can make it through the day now..
So.. Art.. Do you finally catch the drift? Hope so.

Battery life has instantly gone from easily lasting a full day, to 4 hours between charges, it also gets a little warm which it never did before...they must fix the issue or Apple will have a lot of unhappy consumers

I have both mail and calendar configured for my iPhone. In version 3.01 of the OS I had maybe 3-4 days or battery life, now with 3.1 I have maybe 6 hours. So, currently my phone is unusable unless I remove the mail functionality. 6 hours is not enough, I need to be able to count on my phone working the entire day.

IPhone - the worst investment I have ever made - and yeah, my battery life has degraded.

@Arti, lol.. a hobo using an iPhone.

Much much worse - I didn't even think about the fact that the installation of the upgrade coincided with the much degraded battery life. I have a 3G 16GB phone. Before, I got about 12 hours standby and at least a couple hours talk time. Now it is sucked dry after 2-3 hours standby and less than 1 hour talk time. I turned everything off, WiFi, BlueTooth, 3G and don't browse on the Internet unless I really need it. So I have to keep it plugged into a charger all the time. Which is OK if I am around a power source. But that seems to defeat my ability to be mobile. I love my iPhone, but I really think this is substandard performance.

Battery life has gone to hell, especially over the last few days. Full charge in the morning is gone by 12 midday. This is with Airport OFF. iPhone is now very unresponsive to taps - freezing occasionally, then stuttering and continuing. Also random restarts. All since upgrading to 3.1

If I turn on "push", battery life is only about 2 hours. If I turn it off, battery life is normal. OS 3.0 didn't do this. I have a DotMac (now Me.com) account and a Microsoft Exchange 2003 account that I monitor.

for all ya newbee's out there:
THIS BATTERY "PROBLEM" EXISTS SINCE THE RELEASE OF FIRMWARE 3.0 !!!
BEFORE THIS, AT FW 2.2.1, THE BATTERY POWER/LIFE HOLDS ON A 2G OR 3G IPHONE 2-3 DAYS INCL. USAGE. BUT NOW ???
NOBODY KNOWS WHAT APPLE DID, BUT THEY DID A REALY BAD JOB.
*** IT'S TIME NOW THAT THIS GET FIXED !!! ***
I DON'T NEED A MOBILE PHONE WHERE THE BATTERY JUST EVEN LAST NOT ABOUT 24h. THAT'S A SHAME. AND I DON'T SURF MUCH OR USE PUSH OR SIMILIAR.
IN THE FUTURE I WILL NOT BUY ANYMORE A APPLE PHONE. FOR SHURE!
CHEERS
(AN UNHAPPY APPLE IPHONE USER)

it seems worse for me but mayb becuz im always on wifi, but 3.0 i didn't have batt go down as fast as with 3.1, Apple fix this!!!

I have never had my Mophie sucked dry and now it is on E- in just about 2 hours!!!

Way worse for me. Same activity as always but, unlike before, even if I don't use my phone the battery life goes down significantly.

if i restore my iphone will it delete all my contacts and text messages?

Much better for me that's just me!!!

My 3GS's battery has been all over the place. After three hours of minimal use this morning, it was down to 60%. I placed it on the table and left it unused for 30 minutes. When I unlocked it, it was down to 11%. I rebooted and the battery died. After recharging it, it seemed to normalize, but now it's decreasing rapidly again with minimal use.

Much worse - I charge it all night and then within an hour of unplugging it in the morning it is completely dead. I had no issues with the battery before 3.1
3G 16GB

Hey everyone glad I found this. Since 3.1, every morning I have to restart my phone if I want to use it. Not a big deal until i noticed this morning that before I restart the phone displays it has 75% battery, after restart, I get the 20% warning message. I also notice the phone is getting hot during normal operation, and even hotter when I charge it. iPhone 3G, 3.1, WIFI off, BT off, Push off. I use WIFI occasionally when I know I need it.

I thought something was wrong. I kept looking at the battery and thinking things were happening faster than before. I do not think it has been a lot worse, but enough to notice a difference. I then starting seeing people complaining about it. I am glad that I updated, for 3.0 had problems with WiFi, for me was worse. Now my WiFi has gone back (close enough) to what it was in 2.0.
Thanks for listening.

Noticeably worse. I thought it was just me, but
obviously, something changed.

I have noticed a marked decrease in power consumption when using Navigon and iPod (driving with music playing).
Before the car charger could barely keep up. After a long trip the battery would still not be fully charged. Now it is usually at 100% by the time I get home.
The price however is that 3.1 is extremely buggy in handsfree and voice command functions.

Mine is much worse. I am only getting 3-4 hours max in standby and my phone is hot all the time.

I haven't upgraded, but have noticed a lot more instances of no reception. I'm now getting no service in some of the same areas where I got 5 bars.
It takes wither resetting the device or going into and out of airplane mode to get service back.

Much worse.

My 32GB 3GS seems the same. My wife's 16GB 3G is the same or slower - but that might be the fact that it's a year old and loaded with apps.
If anyone notices a difference I suspect it might be the age of the device. Honestly, I hardly even noticed a difference going from the 3G to the 3GS. I guess I don't do anything on it that is so important that I need it to work faster!
For those who complain it only lasts 1/2 a day, I agree that they should get a car/office charger.
Kick Butt
Kick Butt

My iPhone 3G was showing a full battery bar last night; this morning it was completely drained, and won't even turn on - had to plug it in. Has anyone else experienced weird battery issues?

Worse!! I could usually get a days worth of work out of it, but no longer. Overnight my phone completely discharges it's power. It's disappointing to see that the battery life improvements aren't either improving or at least neutral.

@ Mike M
I have the same problem.

The only iPhone that I ever had battery issues with was the first gen. Upgraded to the 3G last year and have always had decent use. As of recent, I always have wi-fi on and am on the phone and Internet all day and play UNO for about 20 minutes. My battery last me until about 10 or 11 at night consistently without having to charge. I also have push notifications on for AIM, Yahoo! and AP. No issues on this phone that I can complain about...as far as battery goes.

I be lucky to get 1 hour's worth of use before my 3g 16 gig batteries die. I push my iPhone hard, I on it every second for that hour with the highest settings on... Apple fix this thank you very much.

I am also getting the black screen. It seems yo happen more when I lock the phone and then try to unlock it again too soon. The screen just doesn't turn on. Nothing. I KNOW you're on cause I just &@$#ing used you!!
Has anyone who's restored as a new phone had this problem since? If I'm gonna lose all my app info then it'd be nice to know it's worth it...

My battery life really BUH-LOWS..

Currently at 50% with 1 Day, 8 hours standby and 1 hour, 52 mins usage. (location services/bluetooth on permanently )
There does seem to have been a minor improvement for me since the upgrade.

@Chris: Thanks for the tip about changing the push settings under advanced! Thought I had it turned off, but obviously not. Should explain why the other night my battery was completely drained for the first time ever. Setting the iPhone up as a new device instead of restoring a previous backup after installing 3.1 I forgot to deactivate push.

I've got everything on (as I did with 3.01) and it's much better. Off charge at 7am and 30% by 11pm.

mine is much WORSE cant hold 8h and before 3.1 the battery life was awesome 3GS

I get about 30 hours out of mine. 16gb 3g. The iPhone is used for about 6 hours a day. I plug in every night and shut apps before locking the screen.

Mine is much worse. 3g 16gb

I haven't noticed any differenc in battery life, but i have gotten a black screen more times than I can count and keep having to reset my phone. It's quite annoying.

9 hours on Wi-Fi is total BS.

Had to work out of the office today so didn't have desk charger. the iPhone w/ 3.1 crapped out in 6 hours - 10 min talk time, intermittent googlemap use in SF to navigate, no wifi, no BT - rebooted fresh when at 100%. And my train ride back was sans iPhone I shut it at 12% so I had some juice left for a 911...
I think iPhone's sex appeal has blinded all users from its fundamental flaws. Without the appeal, masses would reject the iPhone.

My battery life is about the same, but my phone will lock up far more often than it used to. I occasionally had to hard reboot on 2.x series, never on 3.0, and I am have had to do it a half dozen or so times since 3.1. I have not been able to pinpoint any specific activity that triggers it; about 1/2 the time it occurs in Safari, and half the time it freezes on a black (lock) screen, and no call, input, or button push will wake the phone. (No, not jailbroken.) Annoying...

3.1 didnt seem to change anything... but its 3GS that has battery issue even before 3.1 came out.. it drains in less than a day sometimes.. i bought it the day 3GS was released.. i dont use bluetooth... but its always on either wifi or 3G. but a friend of mine just bought 3GS and his battery definitely goes more than mine..

Get the free app "SysStatsLite" which shows you if the CPU in the phone is busy. I noticed a few times that the phone has high CPU usage even on the home screen which means some background processes are consuming power even when I am not running any apps.
I typically reboot the phone if the CPU stays high. This also makes sure any hung apps doesn't continue eating up the battery. I think when an app hangs, pressing the home button doesn't actually shut it down completely.
Now I get more than 50% left after getting home in the evening with 2-3 hours usage during the day.

Battery life is about the same... I moved out of a 3G area so being on Edge all the time makes it last longer anyways, but 3.1 did not bring any extra life to it. The only flaws were some weird sound problems; when I lock my phone the sound is quiet, but when I unlock it's normal. Sometimes it's the opposite. Nothing major, though.

Ditto Bryan. Same exact problems. Battery life seems worse. Screen goes black every now and again. Could be a glitch in my 3.1 update. Must say however, iTunes 9 app management was nice. I also hear, as per Mashable, that Bing image search has trumped Apple in iPhone app search. Haven't gotten to try it yet as I'm on vacation in Hawaii, but when I return...

Hey there guys, I noticed the battery deplution and researched on it and hearing that theres a glitch from restoring your iPhone then restoring it from back up instead of setting it up as a new iPhone. Also theres other stuff that can kill your battery like if u leave push settings on such as IMs, eBay, mail etc. They kill alot of battery but with those turned off i managed to get 6 hours usage time and 36 hours stand by time and still at 24%. Try it, you've got nothing else to lose! (Havn't updated to 3.1 yet)

Much worse. Somehow, it seems Exchange was fetching mail even though I had fetch turned off. Didn't do that in 3.0. I changed the Exchange settings in the "advanced" menu and that seemed to bring it back to normal.

Apple would have made mention if this update made the phone more energy efficient. Why wouldn't they want to openly tout improved battery life. Mine is the same. And yes in response to the post above me, closing apps saves power. Example, If you leave BeeJive open, your data connection stays active as does your battery.

@Arti I'm not on my phone much at all during the day... have two busy kids so no time to be texting/playing, and my battery is below 20% nearly every evening.
Battery plummeted for me with 3.0, and I'm trying not to get my hopes up that it could improve with 3.1...

its between WORST and THE SAME. I voted worst though.
In about 1 hour I loose 10 percent by 10am. By the end of the day ( 6pm) my phone is on airplane mode playing music low with only 10 percent left.
They need to figure something out. Better Batteries or better power management.
However, One thing I started doing is closing apps before I lock the screen. Technically they are still open when the screen is locked. So maybe that should save me some battery.

Seems to be about the same. I did have trouble with my service though. It seemed that if my phone had been off for awhile, when I went to dial somebody my phone would just hang on the dial screen without dialing. The only way I found to fix it was to completely shutdown the phone and restart it. I finally decided to try a restore in iTunes and it seems to have fixed it. For some reason I had a couple extra gigs of space on the phone when I was done!

Apple's software update does not say improved battery life so why would there be ?

If your battery keeps running out, it's because you can't put the damn phone down, you're sexting and playing too many games, and you didn't take the trouble to invest $19.99 on a charger for the office or home.
If you're a heavy user and you just can't stop fidgeting with your phone all day, BUY a charger for your office, one car charger, one dock charger in the tv room and one charger or iPod alarm clock for the bedroom. I guarantee you, will all these cheap purchases you will NEVER run out of batteries.
If you're a student, obviously the phone charges off the laptop. If you travel a lot or you're homeless or something, just buy one of the new high-capacity batteries, there's one on Amazon now and the Dexter that can charge your iPhone from 0% to 100% TWO times before you have to charge the charger.
So enough about battery life already.

My phone has trouble syncing to my car bluetooth on the second phone call made in the car....not the first, but the second and every call after that. It is the strangest thing I have to manually push hands free. ARG!

Initially I thought my battery life was better, but it seems to be the same.

It's awesome! (I use a Mophie Juice Pack Air)
;)
Without it, I have to recharge by 2pm.
It's too bad I can't enjoy the sleekness of the iPhone but the battery pack/case makes the iPhone feel better when typing in the horizontal mode.

Same for me. But 3.1 does seem very slow and laggy for me. And I can't send MMS like some people. So everything is failure. Haha.

Battery life is worse. I also have gotten a black screen several times that I have had to hard reset the device. I have also had sporadic service and I am in the same area.

3GS 16MB, no noticeable difference in battery life

I think it probably depends on what features you have turned on. I think they improved power management because I constantly listen to Bluetooth music, and have wifi on. So with both on constantly I see far better battery life now.

iPhone 3G for me. And my battery life has been cut in half. I turned off push, lowered brightness, reset. Nothing. I'm getting about 3 1/2 hours of use. I was getting 7 with 3.0.1 and the same settings as before.
Please fox this apple!

Battery life seems the same to me (iPhone 3GS).

I'm using a 16 GB 3GS and upgraded to 3.1 on the day that it was release and so far my battery life seems normal.

Worse for me