iPhone XS, XS Max, XR Battery sizes, RAM revealed by Chinese regulator

AppleInsider

Regulatory filings in China have revealed a number of interesting details about Apple's newest iPhones, including that the iPhone XS and XS Max both use 4GB of memory, and while the iPhone XS Max and XR have larger batteries than the iPhone X, the iPhone XS uses a smaller capacity power source.

Filings with China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (TENAA) found by MyDrivers reveal the iPhone XS has a 2,658 mAh battery, smaller than the 2716mAh battery used by its predecessor, the iPhone X. The slight reduction in capacity is unusual, considering the iPhone XS and iPhone X are the same size.

Despite the reduction, the iPhone XS is claimed to offer a longer battery life, with Apple claiming the device capable of 30 more minutes of usage time than the iPhone X.

The larger iPhone XS Max has a bigger battery to match its size, with a capacity of 3,174mAh. While it has to contend with powering a larger display, it also provides even more usage time when put alongside the iPhone X, with an extra hour and a half according to Apple.

The iPhone XR, believed to have the best claimed battery life at 1.5 hours longer than the iPhone 8 Plus, manages to do so with a smaller battery than the iPhone XS Max. According to the filing, the iPhone XR has a battery capacity of 2,942mAh, between the iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max.

The most likely explanation for the long battery life claims is the iPhone XR's use of an LCD display, instead of the OLED version used in the XS models. The smaller screen size of 6.1 inches compared to the 6.5-inch XS Max also helps reduce power usage.

A second item identified in the filings is that both the iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max use 4 gigabytes of memory each. The iPhone XR is noted as being equipped with 3GB of RAM.

The iPhone XS and XS Max RAM was previously rumored in alleged benchmarks of the 2018 iPhone range, including one Geekbench score shortly after Apple's September event, as well as a supposed benchmark in July.

The RAM values for the XS models are up compared to previous iPhone releases. Last year's iPhone X and iPhone 8 Plus each housed 3 gigabytes of memory, while the iPhone 8 had 2 gigabytes.

wonkothesane

I don’t understand how the LCD should account for the longer battery life in the XR as opposed to the OLED. I thought the whole point of OLES (or at least one of the major ones) is the absence of the backlight Illini sting only the “non black pixels” and thus saving significant power?

tshapi

wonkothesane said:

I don’t understand how the LCD should account for the longer battery life in the XR as opposed to the OLED. I thought the whole point of OLES (or at least one of the major ones) is the absence of the backlight Illini sting only the “non black pixels” and thus saving significant power?

Oled itself is power hungry, the reason it can be a battery saver is if the user consistently opts to keep as mug of the screen as black as possible.  

DeadDuck123

wonkothesane said:

I don’t understand how the LCD should account for the longer battery life in the XR as opposed to the OLED. I thought the whole point of OLES (or at least one of the major ones) is the absence of the backlight Illini sting only the “non black pixels” and thus saving significant power?

@wonkothesane that's actually a misconception, and no thanks to some of the early pitching points for OLED. It's true that OLED doesn't need backlight and parts of the screen can be turned off. But to make maximum of that capability, manufacturers will have to use dark UI with lot of black background. Any pixel that is not black is essentially turning on the LED. When you're using normal bright UI, you are not saving any power as most of the screen is lit up. Compared to that few LEDs in backlight grid would use lesser power than fully lit OLED.

So considering all that, smaller size LCD (6.1") will use less power compared to larger OLED (6.5") screen using the same UI. Ofcourse there are other factors contributing to the power usage between the two phones, but screen is definitely one area where decent amount of power saving occurs.

mazda 3s

tshapi said:

wonkothesane said:

I don’t understand how the LCD should account for the longer battery life in the XR as opposed to the OLED. I thought the whole point of OLES (or at least one of the major ones) is the absence of the backlight Illini sting only the “non black pixels” and thus saving significant power?

Oled itself is power hungry, the reason it can be a battery saver is if the user consistently opts to keep as mug of the screen as black as possible.  

Given this point, why doesn't Apple provide a "true" Dark Mode for iOS like it does in the upcoming release of macOS?

ericthehalfbee

4GB RAM.

This should help with those "App Races" that are all the rage now with YouTubers trying to compare performance of phones. They are still useless tests, but it's going to be interesting to see the spin when the iPhones beat others out there. I can't wait to hear the excuses.

robjn

wonkothesane said:

I don’t understand how the LCD should account for the longer battery life in the XR as opposed to the OLED. I thought the whole point of OLES (or at least one of the major ones) is the absence of the backlight Illini sting only the “non black pixels” and thus saving significant power?

Your correct, OLED is more power efficient than LCD. However, in this case the XR has far fewer pixels for the processor to push. This greatly reduces the power demand on the processor and might also result in the XR being faster.

It might be that Apple don’t want the XR to be faster than the flagships so they could have tuned down the processor and this might result in greater efficiency and battery life.

robjn

So the XR only has 3GB of RAM

Considering it’s display has less than half the pixels of the XS MAX, 3GB will do just fine!

Didn’t iPhone X have 3GB?

Twilight Sky

robjn said:

So the XR only has 3GB of RAM

Considering it’s display has less than half the pixels of the XS MAX, 3GB will do just fine!

Didn’t iPhone X have 3GB?

Yes, they mention that iPhone X has 3gb in the last paragraph of the article.

rogifan_new

Heh, I remember here when people claimed 1GB RAM was perfectly adequate. Glad to see Apple is finally future proofing their products a bit with more RAM.

Soli

mazda 3s said:

tshapi said:

wonkothesane said:

I don’t understand how the LCD should account for the longer battery life in the XR as opposed to the OLED. I thought the whole point of OLES (or at least one of the major ones) is the absence of the backlight Illini sting only the “non black pixels” and thus saving significant power?

Oled itself is power hungry, the reason it can be a battery saver is if the user consistently opts to keep as mug of the screen as black as possible.  

Given this point, why doesn't Apple provide a "true" Dark Mode for iOS like it does in the upcoming release of macOS?

Have you tried out Smart Invert?

wonkothesane

Ok, a bit OT.  I tried to read a bit about OLED vs LCD power consumption. Upshot: generally, it would appear as though LCD is generally more efficient in spite of backlight. Advantages of OLED are others. However, actual energy consumption still depends on many factors (amount of “dark pixels” displayed, as mentioned), but also other factors like partial backlight, switching of subpixels (interesting counter effect of the ppi race). Interestingly according to this source OLED TVs would appear to consume generally significantly more thttps://www.rtings.com/tv/learn/led-oled-power-consumption-and-electricity-cost. 

wonkothesane

Soli said:

mazda 3s said:

tshapi said:

wonkothesane said:

I don’t understand how the LCD should account for the longer battery life in the XR as opposed to the OLED. I thought the whole point of OLES (or at least one of the major ones) is the absence of the backlight Illini sting only the “non black pixels” and thus saving significant power?

Oled itself is power hungry, the reason it can be a battery saver is if the user consistently opts to keep as mug of the screen as black as possible.  

Given this point, why doesn't Apple provide a "true" Dark Mode for iOS like it does in the upcoming release of macOS?

Have you tried out Smart Invert?

Doesn’t it still disable night shift? I can’t test it right now as I have only my 6s available right now and iOS 12 has an apparent bug that always shows the search field in sub settings hence covering the smart invert toggle. 

Soli

wonkothesane said:

Soli said:

mazda 3s said:

tshapi said:

wonkothesane said:

I don’t understand how the LCD should account for the longer battery life in the XR as opposed to the OLED. I thought the whole point of OLES (or at least one of the major ones) is the absence of the backlight Illini sting only the “non black pixels” and thus saving significant power?

Oled itself is power hungry, the reason it can be a battery saver is if the user consistently opts to keep as mug of the screen as black as possible.  

Given this point, why doesn't Apple provide a "true" Dark Mode for iOS like it does in the upcoming release of macOS?

Have you tried out Smart Invert?

Doesn’t it still disable night shift? I can’t test it right now as I have only my 6s available right now and iOS 12 has an apparent bug that always shows the search field in sub settings hence covering the smart invert toggle. 

I have no idea about that. I just use it in dark places where I want less light emitting from my display. I use an Accessibility shortcut so that triple-tapping my home button brings it up.

1983

An LCD display with its always on backlight uses less power than an equivalent or close in size, self powered OLED? That’s news to me...