Battery saving: Apple upgrades battery AI functions in iOS 26
As expected, Apple will incorporate new battery monitoring features into its next iPhone operating system. The initial details sound promising.
An iPhone with a "low battery" warning: hopefully you'll see them less often with iOS 26.
(Image: lilgrapher / Shutterstock)
The iPhone is currently not really intelligent when it comes to battery management. Although there is an optimized charging function that learns the user's behaviour and can only fully charge from 80 to 100 percent shortly before the start of the day –, even business trips with different wake-up times can throw the feature out of kilter. With iOS 26, Apple is now promising new approaches to battery management. Following preliminary rumors about battery conservation, further details are now available for the first time.
Necessary improvements
With the new iOS 26 functions, Apple also seems to be preparing for the upcoming "iPhone 17 Air", which will reportedly only have a small battery due to its thinness. The device should use the battery correspondingly sparingly so that the new flat iPhone can also get through the day. The central new battery management feature in iOS 26 is the so-called "Adaptive Power" function. It can be activated via a simple switch in the system settings and should be explicitly advertised again by Apple during setup.
The description states that the iPhone will then make "minor power adjustments" to "extend battery life" in the event of higher battery consumption. This includes not only simple changes such as a slight reduction in screen brightness, but also intervention in "some activities", which then last "a little longer". However, the company does not specify what this means in concrete terms. The familiar low power mode from 20 percent battery level, which can also be activated beforehand, remains the same.
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Charging time is displayed
Another new battery function in iOS 26 concerns the charging time. At the moment, the user never knows how long it will take until the battery is fully charged again. In future, the iPhone will use AI to estimate how long the charging process will take on the currently connected power adapter. The function can be found in the settings under "Battery". Apple's idea here is that if users know how long charging will take, they may refrain from charging at first, which in turn reduces the number of charging processes and keeps the battery cycles short(er). It is to be hoped that the function will also be implemented in the form of a home or lock screen widget so that users can keep an eye on the times.
Incidentally, estimating the charging time is nothing new. It was available on the Mac for a long time, but Apple abruptly turned it off, apparently because the company did not trust its accuracy. Extra tools such as Better Battery 2 are now required for this. It remains to be seen whether Apple will implement even more intelligent battery management functions in iOS 26 when the iPhone 17 Air is released.
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