How to Check Your iPhone's Battery Health

By Leanne Hays Updated 05/11/2020

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Want to check your iPhone's battery health? Apple landed in hot water with customers a few years ago when a feature designed to slow the processors of older iPhone models to keep them from suddenly shutting down came to light. Critics maintained that Apple was throttling the speed of earlier iPhone models to push customers toward newer devices, while Apple insisted that the feature was necessary to cope with aging batteries. Now, Apple lets iPhone users monitor their battery life. You can also enable a feature that reduces aging by optimizing how your battery behaves when charging. Let's get started with how to check your iPhone's battery health. It's quick and easy, and a valuable piece of information about your device. If you like tips on charging, we can also help debunk charging myths and give you guidance on how to safely use non-Apple chargers.

How to Perform a Battery Check on an iPhone

Open the Settings app.
Scroll down and tap on Battery.
Now tap on Battery Health.
You'll see your battery capacity next to Maximum Capacity.
From here, you can also toggle on Optimized Battery Charging.

The Maximum Capacity tells you your iPhone battery's capacity as compared to the capacity it had when it was brand new.

If your battery's maximum capacity has dropped below 80%, a message like this will pop up on your screen if you experience an unexpected shutdown:

You can tap Disable to turn off battery throttling on your iPhone; but at this point, you may want to consider replacing your battery to improve your iPhone's performance and the amount of time it can operate between charges.

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Author Details

Leanne Hays

Leanne Hays is a Feature Writer at iPhone Life, and has written hundreds of in-depth how-to and troubleshooting articles. She's a former Associate Editor for iPhone Life magazine, and has written for the Iowa Source, as well as web content for education marketing. Leanne has an associate's degree in education, with a focus on curriculum development, as well as a bachelor's degree in science. She has over nine years of experience with SEO, social media management, and web development and writing. Despite years of web work, Leanne is by no means an early adapter; she's only owned a smartphone for five years, which makes her highly sympathetic to the learning curve of new iPhone owners. She enjoys making reader's lives easier and putting her education experience to work by walking them through the most practical ways to use Apple devices, step-by-step.

In off-work hours, Leanne is a mother of two, homesteader, audiobook fanatic, musician, and learning enthusiast.