Oliver Haslam·

Could Apple Use Tesla’s Battery Charging Strategy For The iPhone, iPad, And Mac?

With the release of iOS 13 Apple introduced a new feature that is said to help make iPhone batteries last longer. It’s called Optimized Battery Charging and sees to it that iPhones only charge to 100% when the system believes that the phone will be taken off charge soon.

To reduce battery aging, iPhone learns from your daily charging routine so it can wait to finish charging past 80% until you need to use it.

The theory is pretty simple. Batteries that are charged to 100% capacity and then sit at that level are often impacted by issues long term. That can often mean lower overall capacity which is obviously an issue in older iPhones.

However, as 9to5Mac notes, Tesla cars do something a little different. They allow users to set an artificial maximum charging level. Tesla founder Elon Musk says that the best way to run one of the company’s cars is to generally charge it to 80% but then bump that to 100% when a long journey is planned. That way, battery health is preserved during normal use.

9to5Mac points that a similar feature would be a good idea on an iPhone, and it’s difficult to argue against that logic. You could set an iPhone to charge to 80% only, but then increase that to 100% when you have a busy day away from a charger.

The only issue here is that the method only works when a battery routinely lasts way longer than it needs to. But if charging a phone to 100% means your battery is always at 50% at the end of the day, you’d be much better set it to only charge to a maximum of 80% instead.

As with many things, this idea will only work for some people. But for those people, it could definitely be a way to improve battery health over time; if Apple employs it.

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