Steve Troughton-Smith
The iPhone Air battery capacity reaction has been distorted by the current lineup, methinks. It has a battery capacity in between the iPhone 12 Pro and the iPhone 12 Pro Max (from which, I am upgrading — plus five years of wear). Apple's specs page says it gets 7 more hours of video playback than my 12 Pro Max did when its battery was new, and I didn't worry about its battery life until very recently
Sep 17, 2025 at 2:12pmIvory for Mac
Show threadFabienSep 17, 2025
@stroughtonsmith don’t forget cpu and displays etc are more efficient than older models too. (Typed on an aging iPhone mini 12)
Show threadJesalSep 17, 2025
@stroughtonsmith I wish they'd measure battery in some other way, because video playback fully does not capture how I use my phone. My iPhone 16p gets much worse battery life than my 12PM did, despite Apple's stats. Always wonder if some fixed function chips make video playback way more efficient today than 5 years ago.
Show threadJacob WolmanSep 17, 2025
@stroughtonsmith I think there are also a lot of people out there (like me) who have Magsafe chargers/mounts all over the place and habitually just put their phones on them off and on all day. Battery life is a lot less important for that lifestyle, as long as you have a decent external battery for travel etc.
Show threadMatt PfefferSep 17, 2025
@stroughtonsmith very true - the Air slaughters the battery life of my regular iPhone 15 when it was new (according to the specs anyway) and is equal to my wife’s 16 Plus, which has INCREDIBLE battery life
Show threadJacobSep 17, 2025
@stroughtonsmith yea if you really want perspective, compare it to the 8 Plus in terms of total size, weight and battery life and think about how that wasn’t *really* that long ago.
Show threadShantaraSep 17, 2025
@stroughtonsmith Video playback is accelerated using its own dedicated hardware blocks. These numbers are in no way representative of regular GPU/CPU usage
Show threadJeremy KanterSep 17, 2025

@stroughtonsmith The video playback number is definitely favorable to iPhones with ProMotion, right? Since they can drop the refresh rate to the frame rate of the video?

The Air is supposed to get 5 more hours of video playback than the 16, despite the 16 having a 13% larger battery. Will that extend to real-world usage where the display spends more time at 120 Hz?

Show threadSörenSep 18, 2025
@jeremykanter @stroughtonsmith note that the regular 17 now has ProMotion as well
Show threadgastónSep 18, 2025
@stroughtonsmith I've seen some test on YouTube and the battery, even though its smaller, performs the same as the regular 17, which may be due to the more efficient A19 Pro. It seems that it's not nearly as bad as everyone thought it would be.