Let battery die for first time?

Spencerdl

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Welcome to iMore Harcrack. ConGrats on your new iPhone. Yes, I let my battery drain to 0% and turn off by itself once a month. There is nothing official about getting better battery life if this is done, but it seems to work and give my device better battery life.
 

doogald

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Lifehacker had a great article about battery myths recently, one of which was about whether you should drain the battery (tl;dr: no, you really shouldn't, though once in a while is ok - once a month is what used to be recommended, but newer devices like recent iPhones should only do that if you notice the battery meter being weird.)

Five?Smartphone Battery Myths, Explained
 

ame

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I always do it for the first one, and then try to at least once every two weeks. But I also only charge it when it gets down near 1-5%. I get 3 days on a charge.
 

dchandler

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I know when smartphones first came out we used to tell customers to let the battery die one time just to get the memory straight but the new battery doesn't have memory any more so you don't have to let them die then charge them. That's a thing of the past.


Sent from my Super iPhone 6s Plus using Tapatalk
 

moloes

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With ion lithium battery's there is no need to commission the battery for first use. I just charge my new devices to 100% and then on a monthly basis let it completely drain until it turns off and charge to 100%. I've been doing that with all my iPhone's and always had good battery life.
 

Aceroller

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I just charge whenever I need/want to, never have purposely let it die, and I have had excellent battery life on all of my iPhones including this 6S. I really do not think "conditioning" the phone is necessary anymore.
 

Just_Me_D

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Every few weeks or so, I allow my battery to either completely drain or get down to 1% and then recharge it. Whether it's necessary in this day and age, I do not know, but what I do know is that I get great battery life so I will keep on doing my thing with the battery...:)
 

Rob Phillips

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My phone starts the day at 100% (I charge overnight) and finishes darn near 1% just through daily use. It works for me. Besides, I only need it to last until the next iPhone comes out.
 

joe_m_p

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My phone is constantly being charged only because I'm sitting at a desk all day and there's a charger handy. My battery hardly dips below 50% and I've never ran it down zero,intentional or not. I wish Apple had some guidelines on battery management.
 

SnapThrow

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Not necessary, with modern battery technology it's actually worse to drain the battery all the way down. There is no "battery memory" like in the old days...
 

Alkali

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All that is a waste of time. No matter what you do or how you try the battery will die after about two to two to three years.
 

xanadome

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I usually run the battery down at the first use till the phone automatically shutoff. I do not know why I do that, but I read somewhere a long time ago (battery university?) while the Li-ion batteries do not have a memory effect (I know that much), the initial conditioning is preferable. So, I do so. But I also know that running down Li-ion batteries completely dry is detrimental to the battery. But the phone automatically shutting down due to low charge is not the same. It just means that the phone's protection circuit is working.
But I rarely do the thing after that. The only reason I ran down the battery, say, below 50%, is to reset its internal circuit to indicate the accurate battery charge reading. Sometimes, even after the over night charge etc, I see the charge did not reach 100%, or other odd showing (but it's rare). When this happens, after running it down a bit (say, 50%) and back it up to 100%, the problem is gone.
 

JaneGL

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Lifehacker had a great article about battery myths recently, one of which was about whether you should drain the battery (tl;dr: no, you really shouldn't, though once in a while is ok - once a month is what used to be recommended, but newer devices like recent iPhones should only do that if you notice the battery meter being weird.)

Five*Smartphone Battery Myths, Explained

Agreed, this is the newest way to treat smartphone batteries. The old (lol I'm calling a few years ago old!) school of thought used to teach that allowing a full drain and recharge was good for calibration. That's not the case with these new batteries and in fact many suggest you try not to go below 15% because it shortens battery lifespan. As doogald just said, keep it charged as you normally would and save full drains for when you're actually having an issue.
 

JaneGL

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I usually run the battery down at the first use till the phone automatically shutoff. I do not know why I do that, but I read somewhere a long time ago (battery university?) while the Li-ion batteries do not have a memory effect (I know that much), the initial conditioning is preferable. So, I do so. But I also know that running down Li-ion batteries completely dry is detrimental to the battery. But the phone automatically shutting down due to low charge is not the same. It just means that the phone's protection circuit is working.
But I rarely do the thing after that. The only reason I ran down the battery, say, below 50%, is to reset its internal circuit to indicate the accurate battery charge reading. Sometimes, even after the over night charge etc, I see the charge did not reach 100%, or other odd showing (but it's rare). When this happens, after running it down a bit (say, 50%) and back it up to 100%, the problem is gone.

yes, it was battery university as you thought, but that info is no longer relevant to current batteries
 

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