iPhone 12 Pro Max battery smaller than iPhone 11 Pro Max, according to regulatory filing

AppleInsiderAppleInsider
Posted:
in iPhone edited October 2020
A Chinese regulatory filing spotted on Tuesday suggests Apple's iPhone 12 Pro Max sports a less capacious battery than last year's iPhone 11 Pro Max.




A filing with the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's Telecommunication Equipment Certification Center (TENAA) cites iPhone 12 Pro Max's battery capacity as 3,687 mAh. By comparison, iPhone 11 Pro Max, which the 12 Pro Max replaces, was powered by a 3,969 mAh cell.

Lending credence to the document, the 3,687 mAh figure matches listings discovered on hardware certification platforms in July.

The TENAA page also says the 12 Pro Max comes with 6GB of RAM, mirroring information discovered in plist files included with Apple's Xcode 12.1 beta last week.

MacRumors spotted the TENAA filing earlier today.

TENAA


Despite the apparent reduction in capacity, Apple says the iPhone 12 Pro Max performs similarly to last year's handset. A comparison tool -- somewhat vaguely -- claims both iPhone models offer up to 20 hours of video playback between charges. That could be a negative for existing 11 Pro Max owners who need a midday top up.

This year's iPhone includes a number of enhancements, some of which are major power sinks. New photography capabilities like 10-bit HDR and Dolby Vision HDR video recording are perhaps high on the list, but the main check to a long-lasting handset is the inclusion of power-hungry 5G connectivity. Nowhere will that be more noticeable than in the U.S., where iPhone supports speedy mmWave technology.

Apple is doing its best to balance 5G support with handset longevity. As part of that effort, a new battery-saving feature dubbed "Smart Data Mode" automatically transitions iPhone 12 series devices between 4G LTE and 5G as iOS deems necessary. For example, iPhone might remain on 4G for web browsing and listening to music, but will switch to the faster, low-latency 5G for a FaceTime call.

Last week, regulatory filings from Brazil's ANATEL revealed battery specifications for iPhone 12 mini and iPhone 12 Pro, which boast 2,227 mAh and 2,815 mAh cells, respectively.

Apple is due to initiate iPhone 12 Pro Max pre-orders on Nov. 6 ahead of wide availability a week later.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 12
    winstoner71winstoner71 Posts: 114member
    “Not great, Bob.” I could’ve used a few more hours. 
  • Reply 2 of 12
    fafotfafot Posts: 19member
    Most likely because lower power is needed for the A14 5nm chip than the 7nm in iPhone 11. 
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 3 of 12
    caladaniancaladanian Posts: 380member
    What is the additional space used for? It will be interesting to see the tear down. 
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 4 of 12
    CheeseFreezeCheeseFreeze Posts: 1,249member
    I wonder if you’ll be able to disable 5G and stick with 4G. 
    At this time, I don’t care or need it, and I rather have a bit more battery left at the end of the day. 

  • Reply 5 of 12
    JFC_PAJFC_PA Posts: 932member
    You might check the iOS 14 user guide, if there’s a toggle it should be mentioned there. 

    There’s a support doc. You can select LTE only, 

    https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211828



    I wonder if you’ll be able to disable 5G and stick with 4G. 
    At this time, I don’t care or need it, and I rather have a bit more battery left at the end of the day. 


    edited October 2020 watto_cobrajony0
  • Reply 6 of 12
    PetrolDavePetrolDave Posts: 57member
    CheeseFreeze said:
    I wonder if you’ll be able to disable 5G and stick with 4G. 
    At this time, I don’t care or need it, and I rather have a bit more battery left at the end of the day. 

    Most of the UK doesn’t have 5G coverage (nowhere I visit has) so being able to disable 5G would be good.
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 7 of 12
    apple4lizifeapple4lizife Posts: 12member
    That’s apple’s old adage ... “ look, same performance,  smaller battery” honestly just give us the biggest battery possible Apple!.. with the 11pro I think they gave us that ..  but just like the faster adapter, we only got it for one year... 
    bushman480s_Apple_Guymuthuk_vanalingam
  • Reply 8 of 12
    bushman4bushman4 Posts: 858member
    While the iPhone is 5G capable I don’t believe many people will use it much because of their demographics or their user habits  Most likely battery time will be the same
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 9 of 12
    mike1mike1 Posts: 3,284member
    CheeseFreeze said:
    I wonder if you’ll be able to disable 5G and stick with 4G. 
    At this time, I don’t care or need it, and I rather have a bit more battery left at the end of the day. 

    Already announced that the phone will manage 5G use to only use when required. So no 5G signal would mean no 5G radio requirement and therefore no extra 5G battery use.

    watto_cobra
  • Reply 10 of 12
    tomasulutomasulu Posts: 55member
    Meanwhile Android phones have 4500mah so they can do 5g AND 120hz screen. I just don’t get apple’s priority sometimes. 
    chemengin1muthuk_vanalingam
  • Reply 11 of 12
    jcs2305jcs2305 Posts: 1,337member
    tomasulu said:
    Meanwhile Android phones have 4500mah so they can do 5g AND 120hz screen. I just don’t get apple’s priority sometimes. 
    I use an 11 Pro max daily since launch and the battery life is outstanding, but it's heavy as hell IMHO. 12 Pro max is getting even a bit heavier. At this weight cramming a big ol 5000mah battery in it will give people wrist problems! Haha The answer isn't a bigger battery.. B) Apple shows this by getting the same (claimed ) battery life out of a smaller battery in the 12 Pro Max.

    Yes android phones "do' 5g and 120hz but battery life suffers even with those huge batteries. It also creates way more heat during use.. We have seen batteries have issues with heat in the past.. I don't want anything like that going on with my iPhone!  I would love 120hz as well I have used an iPad pro 10.5in and currently a 2020 11in. It's so smooth and the pencil response is amazing. I just don't want it if I have to settle on less battery life, which I think Apple is trying to avoid with iPhone.

    This is from Samsung's website..

    You may notice that your phone's battery drains faster than usual while you are connected to a 5G network. This is a limitation of the current 5G networks, and will be improved as the networks expand.


    Because your phone is connected to multiple networks simultaneously, the battery will drain faster than one would typically expect, and the phone may get warmer than when solely on 3G or LTE.

    Does 120hz drain battery?

    120Hz screen will consume a lot of battery juice, but you shouldn't even worry about it. The S20 Ultra with the screen set at the default 60Hz lasted nearly 12 hours in Tom's Guide test, while the 120Hz S20 Ultra died after nine hours and 13 minutes.

    However, while this phone offers a lot of endurance with the display in 60Hz mode, using the 120Hz refresh rate on the Galaxy S20 ultra's screen take a huge toll on battery life.















    winstoner71watto_cobrajony0
  • Reply 12 of 12
    tomasulutomasulu Posts: 55member
    jcs2305 said:
    tomasulu said:
    Meanwhile Android phones have 4500mah so they can do 5g AND 120hz screen. I just don’t get apple’s priority sometimes. 
    I use an 11 Pro max daily since launch and the battery life is outstanding, but it's heavy as hell IMHO. 12 Pro max is getting even a bit heavier. At this weight cramming a big ol 5000mah battery in it will give people wrist problems! Haha The answer isn't a bigger battery.. B) Apple shows this by getting the same (claimed ) battery life out of a smaller battery in the 12 Pro Max.

    Yes android phones "do' 5g and 120hz but battery life suffers even with those huge batteries. It also creates way more heat during use.. We have seen batteries have issues with heat in the past.. I don't want anything like that going on with my iPhone!  I would love 120hz as well I have used an iPad pro 10.5in and currently a 2020 11in. It's so smooth and the pencil response is amazing. I just don't want it if I have to settle on less battery life, which I think Apple is trying to avoid with iPhone.

    This is from Samsung's website..

    You may notice that your phone's battery drains faster than usual while you are connected to a 5G network. This is a limitation of the current 5G networks, and will be improved as the networks expand.


    Because your phone is connected to multiple networks simultaneously, the battery will drain faster than one would typically expect, and the phone may get warmer than when solely on 3G or LTE.

    Does 120hz drain battery?

    120Hz screen will consume a lot of battery juice, but you shouldn't even worry about it. The S20 Ultra with the screen set at the default 60Hz lasted nearly 12 hours in Tom's Guide test, while the 120Hz S20 Ultra died after nine hours and 13 minutes.

    However, while this phone offers a lot of endurance with the display in 60Hz mode, using the 120Hz refresh rate on the Galaxy S20 ultra's screen take a huge toll on battery life.

    I’m pretty sure that the iPhone with the smaller battery is heavier than most android phones with larger capacity batt... and better screen, smaller notch, smaller bezel, fingerprint reader (arrgh I so want Touch ID back!) and better cam :)

    Yes 5g and high refresh rate need more power. All the more reasons we need a larger fuel tank! Or you can take the easy way out as Apple has done. That said I don’t think it’s anything technical they couldn’t solve. Probably just wanna keep some goodies for the 2021 S upgrade cycle. 
    edited October 2020
Sign In or Register to comment.