Apple’s iOS 8 update for iPhone 6 is full of new features and one of those new features for many users is bad iPhone 6 battery life. This guide will show you how to get better iOS 8 battery life on iPhone 6.
Last month, after some time in the company’s beta program, iOS 8 finally made its way to iPhones, iPads, and iPod touches around the world. Unlike iOS 7, iOS 8 does not overhaul the look and feel of the iOS operating system. Instead, it builds on the foundation that iOS 7 left behind, adding new features, tweaks, and enhancements aimed at improving Apple’s software over the past year.
While the iOS 8 update introduced a host of new features to iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users, it also brought with it a number of issues including poor iOS 8 battery life on the iPhone. While we’ve had a relatively good experience with iOS 8 so far, users have been complaining about the battery effects of Apple’s update.
We didn’t experience bad iPhone 6 battery life on iOS 8 or iOS 8.0.2, but that doesn’t mean we don’t want to help those in need. Here we detail a number of settings you can change and things you can do right now to get better iOS 8 battery life on your iPhone 6 and move forward. Note that mileage will vary.
9 iPhone 6 Battery Life Tips
Find Apps Using Your Battery Life
Apple’s iPhone 6 comes stock with iOS 8; this means you have access to all the new features from Apple. One of these new features is the one that shows you which apps are using the most of your battery life. Often times, bad iPhone battery life is linked to a broken or malfunctioning app.
This feature lets you see which apps are using the most of your battery life. It also lets you find usage and background activity. Apps like Google Hangouts and Google Chrome can consume a lot of battery even if you don’t live in them all day.
To see which apps are using up your iPhone 6 battery life, go to This screen allows you to monitor your recent app usage in the last 24 hours and last week.
Note that you may need to update or uninstall an app to get better iOS 8 battery life. However, if none of this works, you may want to reduce the use of apps that are causing a lot of battery drain on your iPhone 6.
Turn Off Push Email
One of the first settings to change has to do with your email. Push has a tendency to consume a lot of battery life and it may be what is currently consuming your iPhone 6 battery life.
When push is turned on, your iPhone 6 will constantly pull data from the servers and check for new mail. Processes running in the background can shorten battery life, so you should consider turning them off if you don’t need them. If you don’t need email to show up instantly on your phone, push is probably a setting worth turning off.
To set up email manually, go to .
The best option we’ve found so far is to force Fetch the interval between checking for new messages every 15-30 minutes instead of constantly searching. Turning the setting off has also done wonders for our battery life and sanity in the past.
Decrease Screen Brightness
After using iOS 8 for three weeks, we noticed that the beautiful Retina HD display on the iPhone 6 tends to consume a lot of battery life. Fortunately, there is a simple solution to this.
By keeping the brightness of the iPhone 6’s screen to a minimum, you should be able to extend your device’s battery life a little longer on a regular basis.
If you decide to leave Auto-Brightness on, it should keep everything aligned. However, if battery life is absolutely important, you may want to turn this off and set the brightness to the lowest level possible.
You can change the brightness of your iPhone 6 screen within the Control Center, the menu accessible by swiping up from the bottom of the phone. It’s also accessible from device settings and you’ll want to go there and switch.
Turn off 4G LTE
Using the faster 4G LTE network on your iPhone 6 can use more data and therefore cause battery life to degrade much faster than when connected to Wi-Fi. The drain is especially noticeable if you’re on the edge of coverage. Turning 4G LTE off when you’re in spotty areas or when you don’t need it can help save a lot of battery life.
go. When LTE is turned off, your iPhone 6 uses your carrier’s backup network. Some are fast, like T-Mobile’s HSPA+ network. Others are slow. LTE will, in most cases, be faster than anything else that functions as a backup, so keep that in mind before turning it off on your iPhone 6.
Use Airplane Mode
If you are in a really difficult situation and need to save battery life, you can use the device’s Airplane Mode. Airplane Mode cuts out data, texts, and calls, but it also saves battery life in those dreadful moments when your iPhone 6 is on its last legs.
It’s easy to flip in Airplane Mode. Pull up and open Control Center by swiping up from the bottom of your home screen. You can also go to Settings and turn it off. It is located at the top.
Turn off Background App Refresh
Another thing to try is to turn off Background App Refresh. This feature allows apps to connect and update in the background so they can show updates as soon as you open them. Unfortunately, this feature can drain battery life. Even Apple agrees and says “Turning off apps can help conserve battery life” on the iOS 8 Background App refresh screen.
To do this, .
You can turn off Background App Refresh for all apps or for specific apps only. If you see an app with background activity at the top, you may want to close that app.
restart iPhone 6
Even if you haven’t rebooted your iPhone 6 since you got it, or you’ve been gone for a few days without rebooting, go ahead and turn the iPhone 6 off and back on. Sometimes a simple reboot is all it takes to stop what’s causing bad iPhone 6 battery life and reset things so the battery lasts all day.
To do this until the screen changes, then . In a minute or two.
reset all settings
If none of this works, it’s time to move on to more drastic measures. The first thing to try is Reset All Settings. This will not delete your data or content on your iPhone 6, just settings. If something goes wrong, this can fix the dreaded iOS 8 battery life in about 5 minutes.
go Settings -> General -> Reset -> Reset All Settings. If prompted, enter your PIN or password. Wait for the device to reboot and then use your device normally. You may need to reconnect to Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and change some other settings, but your apps, photos, and accounts will be there exactly as you left them.
Restore Your iPhone 6
If that doesn’t work, then it’s time to resort to the most drastic measure. Restoring from scratch can be troublesome, but it also has the potential to clear up iOS 8 battery life issues. This process will clean your iPhone 6 and reinstall iOS 8 from scratch.
You will need to backup iPhone 6 first as this process will delete all your photos, apps and data from the device. You can restore from a backup, but there is a chance that it will restore some issues, so your best bet is to set it up like a new iPhone.
- Plug in and backup to computer or iCloud
- Turn off Find My iPhone – Settings -> iCloud -> Find My iPhone -> Off
- on iTunes, Click Restore
- Follow the prompts and iPhone Reinstall iOS 8 from scratch.
- Click when done Restore from backup Select or to put your information back on iPhone.
This process takes 15 to 30 minutes, depending on download times and whether a backup or restore is needed. Again, it’s a last resort and should only be used if nothing else works.
