You can do several things to avoid running out of juice at a critical moment. The tips here shouldn’t be used all the time — you wouldn’t want to do without an internet connection in most cases, for example — but they’re good options when you need to extend the battery life of your iPad.
Turn off Wi-Fi
Your iPad’s Wi-Fi connection drains the battery, whether or not you are using it connected to the internet. That’s because your iPad constantly looks for networks. If you’re not connected and don’t need to use the internet for a while, you can conserve the iPad’s battery life by turning off Wi-Fi. Here’s how:
Turn off Cellular Data
Some iPad models have a built-in data connection. If your iPad has a cellular connection, the iPad battery drains when cellular data is enabled, whether you’re using the internet or not. If you don’t need to connect to the web or want to conserve battery more than you need to connect, turn off this connection. To do this:
Turn off Bluetooth
You probably have the idea by now that wireless networking of any kind drains battery life. It’s true. So, another way to save battery life is to turn off Bluetooth. Bluetooth networking is used to connect devices such as keyboards, speakers, and headphones to the iPad. If you’re not using anything like that and aren’t planning to anytime soon, turn Bluetooth off. Here’s how:
Disable AirDrop
AirDrop is another wireless networking feature of the iPad. It swaps files from one nearby iOS or iPadOS device or Mac to another over the air. It’s useful, but it can drain your battery even when it’s not in use. Keep it turned off unless you’re about to use it. To turn off AirDrop:
Disable Background App Refresh
The iPadOS is designed to anticipate your needs. For example, when you check your social media accounts after work, they are already updated so you have fresh content waiting for you, courtesy of the Background App Refresh setting. Cool feature, but it requires battery power. If you can live without this helping hand, follow these steps:
Disable Handoff
Handoff lets you answer calls from your iPhone on your iPad or start writing an email on your Mac and finish outside the house on your iPad. It’s a great way to tie together all your Apple devices, but it eats up the iPad battery. If you don’t think you’ll use it, turn it off:
Don’t Automatically Update Apps
If you always want to have the latest versions of your favorite apps, set your iPad to automatically download apps and app updates, including app downloads made on your other devices. Needless to say, this function uses the battery. Disable this feature and manually update your apps instead. Here’s how:
Turn off Fetch New Data
The Fetch New Data setting automatically pushes data such as email to your iPad whenever the data becomes available and the iPad is connected to the internet. Since wireless networking costs battery life, if you’re not going to use this feature, turn it off. Setting your email to fetch periodically (rather than when anything is available) is a good trade for improved battery life. Here’s how to make this change:
Turn off Location Services
Another form of wireless communication the iPad employs is location services. Some apps send you alerts based on where you are — if you allow it. Other apps such as Maps require it to function properly. If you don’t need to get driving directions or use a location-aware app like Yelp, turn off location services like this:
Manually.Hourly.Every 30 Minutes.Every 15 minutes.
Choosing Manually saves the most battery life, but choosing to fetch at other intervals saves some battery life.
Use Auto-Brightness
The iPad’s screen can automatically adjust to the ambient brightness of the room it’s in. Doing this reduces drain on the iPad battery because the screen automatically dims itself in bright locations. To turn on this feature:
Reduce Screen Brightness
This setting controls the brightness of your iPad’s screen. As you can probably guess, the brighter your screen is, the more juice is required from the iPad’s battery. So, the dimmer you can keep your screen, the longer your iPad’s battery life. Tweak this setting by going to:
Reduce Motion and Animations
Starting in iOS 7, Apple introduced some cool animations to the interface, including a parallax Home screen. That means that the background wallpaper and the apps on top of it seem to move on two planes, independent of each other. These are interesting effects, but they drain the battery. If you don’t need them (or if they make you motion sick), turn them off by turning on the Reduce Motion setting. Here’s how:
Turn off Equalizer
The Music app on the iPad has an equalizer built in that automatically adjusts settings, such as bass and treble, to improve the sound of music in specific genres. Because this is an on-the-fly adjustment, it drains the iPad’s battery. If you’re not a high-end audiophile, you can likely live without this being turned on most of the time. To turn it off:
Auto-Lock Sooner
You can determine how quickly the iPad’s screen locks when it isn’t touched for a while. The faster it locks, the less battery life is used. To change this setting:
Turn off Fitness Tracking
Thanks to its array of cool and useful sensors, the iPad can track your movement and activity as a way to record how much exercise you’re getting. This drains battery and — unless you have your iPad on you at all times — doesn’t capture much useful information. (It is more useful on the iPhone, which is with you most of the time.) Disable this feature on the iPad to save some battery life.
Don’t Auto-Upload Photos to iCloud
As you can see, downloading and uploading data is a big cause of reduced battery life. This is especially true of automatic uploads and downloads that happen in the background because you don’t know when they’re going to occur. There is a setting on the iPad that can automatically upload every photo you take to iCloud. This might be important for photographers, but for everyone else, it uses a lot of battery life. Here’s how to turn it off:
Identify Apps That Hog Battery
One of the best ways to save battery life is to figure out which apps use the most battery life and either delete them or reduce how much you use them. Apple gives you the power to identify those apps in a tool that’s super useful, but not widely known. With it, you can see what percentage of your iPad battery each app has used over the previous 24 hours and the last 10 days. This can help you decide if you need to delete battery-hogging apps. To access this tool:
Turn on Low Power Mode
Low Power Mode comes on automatically when your battery reaches 20 percent, but you can enable Low Power Mode at any time to save battery life. This setting reduces background activity and adjusts brightness after a period of inactivity. Here’s how to enable it:
Quitting Apps Doesn’t Save Battery
Everybody knows you should quit apps that you’re not using to save iPad battery life, right? Everybody is wrong. Not only does quitting apps not save any battery life, but it can also actually harm your battery. Learn more about why this is true in 30 Tips to Save Battery on iPhone.
