iPad Pro 10.5 - Battery draining too fast?

[Doctor Hades]

I have owned various iPads over the years since my first iPad 4 in 2012. I've then upgraded to an iPad Air 2 and finally an iPad Pro 10.5 (2018 model, 2nd generation, I believe), I also own the iPad mini 2, although I don't use that much these days.

The first two iPads worked fine and would give me around 8-10 hours of use depending on whether I was browsing the internet or watching YouTube. This remained pretty much consistent for the lifespan of the iPad and beyond (my mother and sister got my previous ones and used them fine).

My iPad 10.5 Pro worked fine until, I think, IOS 13 or 14 then it seems like the battery drains alarmingly quick such that I typically only get around 4-5 hours use out of it, at most, and sometimes less. I watch a lot of YouTube on my iPad plus some NetFlix/Amazon Video but the battery seems to drain really quickly. Screen Brightness is on 25% or thereabouts, Notifications are off for most apps and I have Background Refresh disabled for all apps except my email which is set to Fetch every 1 hour. I also use the iPencil (1st generation) one rather than my fingers as I like to keep the screen clean (yeah, I have OCD!) but I'm not sure just how much battery having Bluetooth on for the pencil actually uses. Prior to owning the iPencil I used a cheap stylus.

I did keep my iPad connected to the mains for several months at one point as I only used it in bed and wonder if this has somehow damaged the battery?

What is weird is that if I restart my iPad then the battery % indicator can actually increase and on one occasion my iPad lasted over an hour watching YouTube even though it was on 1%!!!

Would backing up, refreshing/resetting the iPad then restoring the data make any difference?

 

[Doctor Hades]

I should also add that I use a third-party 2m cable for charging my iPad from the mains as the one that comes with the device is too short to reach where I place it to recharge. I still use the iPad charging plug however.

 

[kenshingintoki]

Mine too. Battery life terrible. ITs just an aging battery and probably planned obscolence. Time to upgrade. I won't be getting top of the line model again and these devices are pretty much disposable re: battery.

 

[Flatcoat]

I have a Mini 4 which suddenly started draining the battery very quickly when not in use. I tried a factory reset followed by restore and itwas the same. I then contacted Apple who checked the battery and it was fine and suggested I take it to a service centre.
Thinking about all of the above I did a factory reset but set it up as a new iPad with only Safari setup. Battery life is fine now.

 

[davidf]

Might be worth checking all settings - a software update may have set some battery saving settings back to default and cause the battery to drain quicker.