Is your iPad Pro battery draining fast? Try fixing it with these troubleshooting tips.
Our iPads help us stay connected, surf the web, and take amazing photos. That is, when we’re not searching for a charging cord. Is your iPad Pro not holding a charge? Rather than cursing and throwing your device — as much as you might want to! — here’s what you can do to fix iPad Pro battery drain problem and get on with your life.
So if you’ve been asking yourself, “Why is my iPad Pro dying so fast?”, check out the iPad battery-saving tips below to keep your device running longer.
Why is my iPad Pro battery draining so fast?
Before you can learn how to save battery on your iPad Pro, it’s important to know why it no longer holds a charge. There are several reasons this could be happening, from background apps to bad connections. These are the issues iPhoneArena staff come across the most:
POOR BATTERY HEALTH
Whether you’ve had your iPad Pro for a few years or a few months, its battery health may have started to decline. Want to see how yours is doing? Open Settings > Battery > Battery Health.
APPS
Your iPad Pro is packed with cool apps—from games to streaming services—but they can weaken your battery with prolonged use. To find out which ones are draining the most power, open Settings > Battery. You’ll also be able to see how much time you spend using each app (in case you want to adjust your screen time).
THE CHARGING PORT OR CABLE
Whether the cable is loose, unplugged, or damaged or the port is clogged with dirt and debris, it could be the reason your device isn’t powering up. If the port is dusty, try to clean the charging port .
SOFTWARE UPDATES
iPadOS updates can take a toll on your iPad’s speed, performance, and battery life. If you recently installed new software and have noticed your iPad Pro battery draining quickly, be patient. Your iPad may need some time to adapt, especially if it’s low on storage space (which may drain your battery as well).
SETTINGS
If your iPad Pro no longer holds a charge, certain settings could be to blame. Screen brightness, Bluetooth, GPS, or even your Wi-Fi connection settings can drain your battery when these features are turned on.
How to fix iPad Pro battery drain issue
Once you’ve determined what is draining your iPad Pro battery, there are several ways to give it a boost. Here’s how to make an iPad Pro battery last longer, according to our experts:
1. Activate Low Power Mode
One of your strongest weapons against iPad Pro battery drain is Low Power Mode. With it enabled, your iPad only performs the most essential of tasks, so background activities like downloads and mail fetching are disabled.
Low Power Mode will automatically kick in when the battery falls below 20%, but you can also activate it manually to keep your iPad going for longer. Head over to Settings > Battery > Low Power Mode and toggle it on. When activated, the battery icon in the status bar will turn yellow.
2. Lower Screen Brightness
iPads displays are brighter these days, but those crisp screens keeping you awake at night are murder on your battery life. The good news is you can easily dim them.
First, activate auto-brightness. Navigate to Settings > Accessibility > Display & Text Size > Auto-Brightness and toggle it on. Your iPad will adjust its brightness based on your current lighting situation. If you have enough light to see, the screen will turn itself down to save battery.
You can also manually adjust brightness levels in Settings > Display & Brightness, by using the the slider bar. A slider is also accessible via the Control Center; press lightly on the brightness icon and move the slider up or down.
3. adjust auto-lock settings
Auto-Lock controls the length of time before your screen turns off. To save iPad Pro battery life, choose a shorter Auto-Lock setting. It’s simple:
Open Settings > Display & Brightness.
Tap Auto-Lock and choose a length of time. Our staff recommend 30 seconds.
4. Disable Location Services
Location Services is a helpful feature that uses cell towers, Wi-Fi hotspots, GPS, and Bluetooth to pinpoint your approximate location, but these services can also burn through the battery. When turned on, your apps can access your location. Turn it off for those that don’t need to know:
- Open Settings > Privacy > Location Services.
- You can turn off Location Services at the top of the screen or change the settings for each app by tapping Never, Ask Next Time, While Using the App, or Always, when the option is available.
Keep in mind that certain apps like Maps and Weather won’t function properly without Location Services. But to save battery, iPhone Arena staff recommend setting location features to While Using the App.
5. Disable Background App Refresh
When you close an iPadOS app, it will keep running for a bit until entering a suspended state. With Background App Refresh, however, those suspended apps can still check for updates and new content—a process that can drain iPad Pro battery life.
You can disable Background App Refresh completely or just for certain apps. Navigate to Settings > General > Background App Refresh. Tap Background App Refresh up top to turn it off, or opt to have it happen only over Wi-Fi.
To disable on an app-by-app basis, return to the previous menu and find refresh-heavy apps, like email or social media platforms. Toggle them off. This shouldn’t have any effect on how the app works, but might take a moment longer to surface new information when you return to them.
6. Cut Down on Notifications
If your screen lights up with a preview of every notification you receive, it’s consuming power with each text, breaking news alert, or Twitter follow. Cutting down on these interruptions can save your battery and sanity. Open Settings > Notifications and customize how, when, and where specific apps will show notifications.
Another option is to directly select a notification you would like to disable in the future. Swipe left on such a notification and tap Manage. Here, you can choose to have the alert delivered quietly, which means it will go to your Notification Center without displaying on your lock screen, playing sound, or showing a banner or badge icon. You can also turn off notifications for this app completely.
7. Enable Airplane Mode
If you’re in a real power jam, put your iPad in Airplane Mode, which turns off all your device’s wireless features. Calls and emails won’t come through, but you can still connect to Wi-Fi if necessary for iMessages and other tasks. The easiest way to do this is to look for the airplane icon in the Control Center and tap it. It’s also accessible in Settings; just toggle it on. You’ll know it’s activated by the airplane icon on the status bar.
8. Turn Off Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and AirDrop
Using Wi-Fi is a great way to cut down on the amount of data you use, but it doesn’t do wonders for your battery if you’re not currently using it. Your iPad continuously searches for nearby Wi-Fi networks, which is why the list of available networks constantly changes when you’re out and about. Similarly, Bluetooth and AirDrop are constantly looking to connect, but there’s no reason for them to be active at all times.
The quickest solution is to shut off these services under the Control Center. You can tap the Wi-Fi or Bluetooth icons to turn them off. Press down slightly on the menu options in the top left to view the AirDrop icon. You can also go to Settings > Wi-Fi, Settings > Bluetooth, and Settings > General > AirDrop > Receiving Off to turn them off. Just remember to turn these services back on when you actually need them.
9. Turn Off Siri Suggestions
Your digital assistant, Siri, will make suggestions based on your activity. If you get coffee most days, for example, Siri may suggest your order around the time you normally place it. That’s great, but your assistant has to do some work in the background to make this happen, which—you guessed it — drains your iPad Pro battery. Navigate to Settings > Siri & Search. Under Siri Suggestions, you can enable or disable them in search, on the lock screen and home screen, or while sharing.
10. Kill Active Listening
The iPad Pro support hands-free Siri, meaning you can say “Hey, Siri” and ask a question without having to touch your iPad. But that means the device is always awaiting your command and using up precious resources. If you don’t use Siri that much, turning off active listening could help with iPad Pro battery drain. Navigate to Settings > Siri & Search, where you can disable ”Listen for ‘Hey Siri.’” Leave Press Home for Siri (on an iPad with a Home button) or Press Top Button for Siri (on other iPad models) enabled, to call Apple’s assistant with the push of a button.
11. Turn Off Automatic App Updates
It’s always a good idea to keep your apps and operating system up to date. Some updates can help apps run faster and smoother, decreasing the processing power needed to make them function. By default, your device supports automatic app updates, meaning when an app update arrives, your iPad will install it in the background so you’re always up to date. That process can drain iPad Pro battery, though, so go to Settings > App Store > App Updates and toggle it off.
12. Remove Motion Effects
Dynamic wallpapers—backgrounds that contain movement and change over time—look cool but drain your iPad Pro battery. If you’re using one, consider choosing static wallpaper under Settings > Wallpaper > Choose a New Wallpaper > Stills. (Dynamic wallpaper and perspective zoom are automatically turned off when an iPad is in Low Power Mode).
Turn off the motion effects on apps by navigating to Settings > Accessibility > Motion > Reduce Motion, and toggle it on. Note, however, that this will also disable screen transitions and effects that dissolve as well as the parallax effect—where your wallpaper, apps, and alerts move with you as you tilt your iPad.
13. Manage Vibrations
Did you know the mechanism in your iPad Pro responsible for vibrations actually eats up battery life? Since the little motor inside the device that is in charge of vibrations requires energy, it may help a bit to silence your device. To disable it, go to Settings > Sounds & Haptics and turn off Vibrate on Ring and/or Vibrate on Silent.
14. Tame iCloud
Apple’s iCloud Photos feature will send photos you take on your iPad to the cloud, so you can access them on other devices and the web. It’s a nice feature, especially if your iPad is lost, stolen, or damaged. But yes, sending those photos to the cloud requires battery power. If you need a little extra battery power while you’re out and want to take the risk, disable this via Settings > Photos > iCloud Photos.
15. Reset your iPad
Rebooting, restarting, or resetting is the oldest cliche in troubleshooting because it works. Sometimes a good reset is all that’s needed to kick bad bits loose and fix iPad Pro battery drain issue.
Here’s how to reset the iPad Pro with home button:
- Press and hold down both the Power (on/off) button and the Home button at the same time.
- Keep holding them down as the screen turns off.
- Keep holding them down until you see the Apple logo.
- Let go.
Here’s how to reset the iPad Pro without home button:
- Press and quickly release the volume up button.
- Press and quickly release the volume down button.
- Press and hold the Power button until you see the Apple logo.
- Let go.
16. Restore as new
Sometimes restoring from an old backup, especially a backup of a different device like an iPhone, can be less than ideal. Cruft builds up and things just don’t run like they used to. Sometimes your once-fresh setup also goes stale.
If you suspect that’s the case, you can suck it up and set up your iPad as new. Yes, it can be an incredible pain in the apps, but if you have a significant and continual problem, and nothing else can fix it, setting up as new can be a solution for fixing iPad Pro battery drain issue.
You will have to set a lot up again, including entering passwords and settings, and you will lose all your saved data like game levels, but in most cases, your battery life will be better than ever.
17. Contact Apple
Every once in a while, you get a problem you just can’t solve. Like any electronics, sometimes things go wrong. If you have AppleCare or AppleCare+, you should absolutely book a Genius Bar appointment and avail yourself of it. If you don’t live close to an Apple Store, you can call 1-800-MY-APPLE in order to set up a mail-in repair.
More ways to fix iPad Pro battery drain issue
If any of these tips fixed your iPad Pro battery drain problem, let me know. If you’ve got any tips of your own, let me know that too.
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