Many iPhone batteries not fully charging
According to Apple's iPhone User Guide, while the unit is being charged, the iPhone's battery status indicator (located on the upper-right portion of the screen) will change from a lightning bolt icon to a plug icon [see screenshot at left]. However, a surprisingly high number of users are reporting that the plug icon never appears, perhaps indicating that the battery never fully charges.
In our "Optimizing iPhone Battery Life" article, we noted that if your iPhone takes 10 or more hours to fully charge and never displays a plug icon, you should first try restoring the device. You may also want to try fully draining your iPhone battery and then recharging. UPDATE: It also appears that some iPhones will not fully charged unless they are turned off, then plugged into a wall outlet. Failing these options, you may want to considering contacting Apple for possible repair, maintenance or replacement.
In-house, at least one of our iPhones never displays the plug icon in its battery status indicator, even after restore and full power drain.
It is as of yet unclear whether or not this is a serious issue. Our in-house iPhone that ostensibly never fully charges delivers what we believe is normal battery life and does not exhibit any other significant problems.
If you have an iPhone that appears to never achieve a full charge, please let us know.
My theory is that the _initial_ charge time on a new unit takes a long time - approx. 24 hours, certainly not in 4 or 5 hours as popularly believed and should be performed prior to any first use. While the unit will work right out of the box, heavy current demands on a battery in this condition may permanently damage one or more of the individual cells. Fully draining a battery in this instance is not a good practice. Next, the user expectations on such a device are very high - I don't think it is realistic to expect any battery operated device to charge for 3 or 4 hours and then operate for 3 or 4 days utilizing intensive power functions like internet browsing through WI-FI or EDGE.
I have found that the battery indicator functions quite accurately - it's not that the phone "isn't charging", it may be the battery has never been fully charged for a long enough time period.
- by henryezeh January 11, 2009 9:43 AM PST
- Hi Tedster,
- Like this Reply to this comment
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(3 Comments)Are you suggesting to charge iphone for 24 hours?
Mine has just had the first charge which was for about 8 hours and I did not see
any full charge icon.
THE BATTERY HAS GONE DOWN TO 3/4 BY 17.42 FROM OFF CHARGING AT ABOUT 3AM!!!!!