iPad mini Mini 6 battery life worse than Mini 4?

[AltecX]

Has anyone else noticed that the Mini 6 has worse battery life than their Mini 4? Most noticeably in standby time.

I love the device, but I feel like I'm charging it a LOT more often. Maybe due to the Pencil always charging from it?

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I have no pencil but it "feels" like it has less battery than my old iPad Mini 2 which is at least a 3 or 4-year-old battery in a heavily-used device.

I've followed lots of tips online to improve battery life- there's all kinds of things turned on by default that burn battery- but still, it seems that the battery does not last as long as that old, OLD one.

I plan to do a head-to-head test soon: charge both to 100%, put both in airplane mode, leave them alone for 24 hours and then check battery life. Conceptually, under those conditions brand new battery should trounce old used battery. But we'll see.

Other than that and no headphone jack, I otherwise think the 6 is spectacular. If I could make 3 product wishes, it would be for those 2 plus the iPhone/Pro MAX cameras. 4 wishes? An even higher internal storage tier.

I'm hoping this is an iOS optimization issue that is addressed in an upcoming software update. I've seen battery burn addressed that way before and hope that turns out to be something here.

 

[Hoo Doo Dude]

No, my Mini 6 is quite a bit better than my old Mini.

 

[Realityck]

Has anyone else noticed that the Mini 6 has worse battery life than their Mini 4? Most noticeably in standby time.

I love the device, but I feel like I'm charging it a LOT more often. Maybe due to the Pencil always charging from it?

Lots of things happen in standby if you don't tweak your settings or even the web page you have it pointed to.

Here are some power saving settings I utilize when pushing its limits.

Disable majority of app notifications, except a few delivery quietly such as mail.
Announce notifications off,
Siri suggestions, do you need any? Otherwise turn them all off.
In Siri & Search I only have Show App in search active, everything else is off
No sound for new mail
Turn off bluetooth if not using
Auto Lock 2 mins
Display & Brightness use dark mode only

Good to monitor what apps are consuming most of battery, sometime you will see apps that are updating or doing something in the background that can consume power excessively.

FaceTime is a real battery consumer, use it sparingly if your worried bout battery life, or do it mostly with power is connected.

Don't leave your Safari with MacRumors foremost, as its rotating ads consume battery faster then 99% of web sites out there even in private mode even when you are not using safari. Even on my M1 iMac it complains their URL is consuming too much resources.

Pay attention to attention to screen brightness the higher it is exponentially faster your battery charge will go.

iCloud sync can waste battery too if syncing in the background.

Yes once you get the iPad mini 6 not doing so much in the background, don't have safari pointed to Mac Rumors, you get many hours from it after it is past its initial battery recharging period.

 

[AltecX]

Lots of things happen in standby if you don't tweak your settings or even the web page you have it pointed to.

Here are some power saving settings I utilize when pushing its limits.

Disable majority of app notifications, except a few delivery quietly such as mail.
Announce notifications off,
Siri suggestions, do you need any? Otherwise turn them all off.
In Siri & Search I only have Show App in search active, everything else is off
No sound for new mail
Turn off bluetooth if not using
Auto Lock 2 mins
Display & Brightness use dark mode only

Good to monitor what apps are consuming most of battery, sometime you will see apps that are updating or doing something in the background that can consume power excessively.

FaceTime is a real battery consumer, use it sparingly if your worried bout battery life, or do it mostly with power is connected.

Don't leave your Safari with MacRumors foremost, as its rotating ads consume battery faster then 99% of web sites out there even in private mode even when you are not using safari. Even on my M1 iMac it complains their URL is consuming too much resources.

Pay attention to attention to screen brightness the higher it is exponentially faster your battery charge will go.

iCloud sync can waste battery too if syncing in the background.

Yes once you get the iPad mini 6 not doing so much in the background, don't have safari pointed to Mac Rumors, you get many hours from it after it is past its initial battery recharging period.

I haven't done any of that on my Mini4 why would I need to do any of that on my Mini 6 to have comparable battery?

The device does little more than check email, act as a Kindle, and do some web/Discord use. I don't even use iCloud, FaceTime or Siri.

 

[bobcomer]

I've been using my Mini 6 a lot more than any previous iPad I have had, so I can't really tell if its better or not, but it's not noticeably bad.

 

[ofarlig]

I have about the same standby battery life as my Mini 5, as in almost no drain at all. As for battery life while using it is about the same as well. I did set up mine as a new device though since I had some problems when taking my Mini 5 backup and restoring from it.

Having the pencil attached will drain it faster though from my experience.