Is iOS 18.5 causing battery drain on my iPhone 15 Pro Max?

Did you force restart your iPhone after you updated? This is something I do after EVERY iOS update and I have never had an issue afterwards. Do this on your iPhone and see if things improve --> Force restart iPhone - Apple Support

Smacrae1 wrote:

Thanks for all your replies the forced restart hasn’t fixed it. Anyway why in this day and age does it need that? I think there is a problem with 18 I suppose Apple will stick their head in the sand and ignore it until they figure out a fix.

it's very hard for Apple to "figure out a fix" for an issue that doesn't affect most users. iOS 18.5 has caused absolutely no battery drain on either of our iPhones. But with every iOS update which has come out that I can remember over the years, there is always a small fraction of people who are convinced the update caused battery drain on their phone. I'm not suggesting you don't have battery drain. I'm suggesting it's not necessary a result of an update.

Here's what I would do if I were you, since the forced restart didn't do anything. I'd back up my iPhone, then restore my iPhone from backup. Preferably using a computer as using a computer will install a fresh copy of iOS on your phone.

See how to do this here --> Restore your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch from a backup - Apple Support

ravenby wrote:

all versions of iOS after 18.3 greatly reduced battery life. things got really bad on ios 18.5. I don't want to use such a device. it feels like any update breaks the iphone. there is no desire to install updates. It's like you're not fixing and fixing bugs, but adding new ones. everything is very bad so far. I'm thinking of changing the entire apple ecosystem to competitors (for the first time since 2007.

You are welcome to choose any device you wish. Doing so won't matter to anyone here on this user to user only forum, which no one from Apple participates or will see your comment.

iOS updates DON'T cause battery drain. If iOS updates universally caused battery drain, this forum would be literally littered with people complaining, yet it's not. But that doesn't mean something isn't draining your battery. What you need to do is determine what is draining YOUR battery. One way to see that is to open Settings > Battery and look at the list of things which are using the most charge. From there you can certainly force close them.

When was the last time you Force Restarted your iPhone? A Forced Restart is recommended after iOS updates. Perhaps this is why I have never experienced any battery drain after any iOS update in all the years I've owed iPhones. This is how to do a Forced Restart --> Force restart iPhone - Apple Support

Yes, some iPhone 15 Pro Max users (including some of my friends and family) have reported increased battery drain after updating to iOS 18.5. While this can be a common occurrence after any major update, with apps and the system needing time to adjust, some users have experienced a noticeable and persistent drain. It's also not just this update, a lot of Apple's updates cause this noticeable problem.

Then post a screenshot of your graph including the top apps using the last 24 hours option for viewing the data.