Apple found to overestimate its iPhone’s battery life by 50%

We’re all used to overambitious marketing claims made by smartphone companies, but something you don’t expect companies to fib about is their devices’ batteries.

UK consumer watchdog Which? suggests that the likes of Apple and HTC appear to “overstate the battery life length of their mobile phones”.

“Which? tested nine iPhone models and found that all of them fell short of Apple’s battery time claims. In fact, Apple stated that its batteries lasted between 18% and 51% longer than the Which? results,” the body wrote in its report, published on Saturday.

It noted that Apple’s budget iPhone XR “had the biggest battery overestimation for talk time on full charge.” The watchdog noted that “the battery lasted for 16 hours and 32 minutes, whereas Apple claimed that it would last 25 hours — 51% more.”

HTC’s also in the naughty corner. The Taiwanese manufacturer was found to overestimate its products’ battery life by 5%. Not exactly 51% by any means.

More interestingly, Which? found that some brands underestimate their battery life claims.

“Nokia, Samsung and Sony all underestimated talk time when compared to Which? tests. In particular, Sony devices achieved a talk time in Which? tests that was 21 per cent higher than the manufacturer claimed – 16 hours rather than 12.6 hours,” it added.

It noted that the Sony Xperia Z5 in particular lasted more than eight hours longer than Sony claimed it would on a single charge.

Apple responded with the following: “We rigorously test our products and stand behind our battery life claims. With tight integration between hardware and software, iPhone is engineered to intelligently manage power usage to maximize battery life. Our testing methodology reflects that intelligence.”

Read the full report here.

Feature image: Apple