POWER PLAY
Apple admits it slows down old iPhones — to prevent unexpected battery shutdowns
CUPERTINO » Among legions of Apple users, the notion that Apple slows down iPhones as they age was a widely shared but unverified concept for many years.
Yet on Wednesday, Apple acknowledged that it does limit iPhone performance with new iOS software updates, according to multiple media outlets.
Apple’s statement followed a study this week that asserted Apple curbs the speed of aging iPhones. The study went viral.
The Cupertino tech giant explained it put in checks, which limit computing power but preserve iPhones from unexpected shutdowns due to overuse of battery power.
“Our goal is to deliver the best experience for customers, which includes overall performance and prolonging the life of their devices,” said Apple, in a statement sent to
media outlets including TechCrunch, BuzzFeed News and The Verge. “Lithium-ion batteries become less capable of supplying peak current demands when in cold conditions, have a low battery charge or as they age over time, which can result in the device unexpectedly shutting down to protect its electronic components.”
The study that preceded Apple’s statement was published Monday by John Poole, the founder of Primate Labs and the Geekbench app, which benchmarks desktop devices and smartphones, including the iPhone. Poole independently studied the phenomenon after a Reddit post, about replacing batteries on old iPhones helping to improve performance, drew more than 800 comments.
Poole noticed a significant downgrade in performance between iPhones 6 and 7 running iOS 10 and 11. He correctly hypothesized that Apple introduced a change to limit computing performance.
“I believe (as do others) that Apple introduced a change to limit performance when battery condition decreases past a certain point,” wrote Poole.
Apple said the change was an unannounced feature to protect the iPhone.
“Last year we released a feature for iPhone 6, iPhone 6s and iPhone SE to smooth out the instantaneous peaks only when needed to prevent the device from unexpectedly shutting down during these conditions,” said Apple. “We’ve now extended that feature to iPhone 7 with iOS 11.2, and plan to add support for other products in the future.”
For years, iPhone users, tech analysts and journalists floated the idea of “planned obsolescence” — that Apple throttles old iPhones’ performance to squeeze users into upgrading to the newest model. Apple was accused of planned obsolescence over the iPhone 4s in a New York lawsuit in 2015.
Opinions and studies remained divided on this issue. Futuremark, a Finnish benchmarking company, published a study in October which concluded that Apple does not throttle older devices and that it “actually does a good job of supporting its older devices with regular updates that maintain a consistent level of performance across iOS versions.”
Responding to whether Apple’s statement runs contrary to Futuremark’s conclusions, Futuremark spokesperson Ryan McCall said the statement had “nothing to do with the concept of forced (obsolescence).”
“In essence, this is a matter of the battery not being able to perform, and the device having to compensate,” said McCall. “It’s a trade-off between unexpected device crashes and lower maintained performance without crashes.”
Apple did not clarify in its statement whether replacing the batteries, which can be done officially at $79 for those without AppleCare+ warranty program, will help improve performance.
Apple did not respond to questions from this news organization about whether battery replacements will help old iPhones’ performance, and whether other Apple products like the iPad or the MacBook have similar performance checks to prevent unexpected shutdowns.
For those who hope to save money in replacing a battery, a standalone iPhone battery can cost as little as $45, according to Kyle Wiens, founder of a self-repair manual website called iFixit. While he criticized Apple’s official battery replacement cost, he said he believes the iOS feature to curb performance for battery preservation is a “reasonable” approach.
“I think this software change is a good change,” said Wiens. “They should not revert back.”
However, Wiens and other Apple analysts said the company’s acknowledgment Wednesday needs to be its first step of many to be more transparent about the iPhone’s battery and performance issues.
“They should have been letting us know beforehand, and there should have been an option to turn the feature off,” said Creative Strategies analyst Ben Bajarin. “It was good they responded, but hopefully this is Apple wanting to be more transparent.”