As a new iPhone or any Apple product is launched, we get to hear about all its specifications and price. Along with that, Apple also tells us about its battery time and what time it may last on a single charge. We have also settled on the fact that Apple does not reveal its battery capacity in terms of mAh. All we get is an estimated battery time which has been tested by Apple in restricted conditions. So we generally see that the real-world battery time is usually different then what Apple claims.
However, a new report from the UK based consumer advocacy group Which? reveals a serious problem. Which? can be understood as the UK’s equivalent of US’ Consumer Reports. So it can be said that the reports from this organization are mostly accurate. Which? says that they have tested 9 iPhone models to test their battery time. And the report reveals that all of the 9 models fell short of their claimed battery time.
The worrying factor, however, is that all the 9 iPhone models fell short of Apple’s battery time claims by 18% to 51%. Which? says that Apple is overstating their battery time claims by a “massive margin” then what they actually are. In the tests by Which?, iPhone XR lasted to provide only 16 hours and 32 minutes of talk time. But Apple claimed last year that iPhone XR gives 25 hours of talk time.
Interestingly, Which? claims that only Apple’s claims were overstated as it compared devices from other manufacturers such as HTC, Sony and the likes. HTC’s claims were found to fall short by just 5% whereas Sony overstated their battery time by 21%. After Which?’s report was published, Apple quickly issued a statement on the matter to Business Insider:
“We rigorously test our products and stand behind our battery life claims. With tight integration between hardware and software, iPhone is engineered to intelligently manage power usage to maximize battery life. Our testing methodology reflects that intelligence. Which? haven’t shared their methodology with us so we can’t compare their results to ours. We share our methodology for testing which we publish in detail here.”
