Bad Battery Life & a Warm iPhone After iOS 7.0.6 Update? That’s Easy to Fix

Some iPhone and iPad users, myself included, have experienced an unusual level of battery drain after updating devices to iOS 7.0.6. This is typically accompanied by an iPhone (or other device) feeling abnormally warm to the touch.

This isn’t a universal experience by any means, but impacted iPhone devices show truly rapid battery drain – so rapid that users can basically watch the battery percentage gauge tick down. Screen shots aren’t going to demonstrate the device heat that accompanies the issue, but the image below gives an idea of how quick the battery can go down. Note that almost immediately after this specific device received the “20% battery remaining” alert message, the actual battery indicator was already down to 17%.

Most of the other users who have reported problems also find rapid draining to be an observable event, with the device rapidly draining while in standby mode or with the percentage indicator ticking away at a clocks pace when the iPhone is in use.

The Quick Fix for a iOS 7.0.6 Battery & Heat Issue

For such a small security update to cause excessive loss to battery life and to a limited group of devices is a bit odd, but fortunately it’s also easily corrected with a 2-step procedure:

1. Quit every open app on the iPhone by going to the multitasking screen (double-tap on the Home button) and swiping up on every app to close it
2. Forcibly reboot the iPhone by holding down the Home and Power button until the device restarts

This two-step process worked for resolving the rapid battery drain problem on several iPhone models that experienced the issue post-update, after regular reboots did just about nothing.

There are varying reports of issues continuing until a device was fully restored to iOS 7.0.6 through iTunes / iCloud, though that really shouldn’t be necessary. If you do have to go that route, be sure to backup before doing so.

Let us know your own experiences with battery issues and any resolutions in the comments.

Quick side note: if you haven’t updated to iOS 7.0.6 yet you should do so now, it fixes a critical security flaw that is simply too risky to leave unpatched. The battery issue described here is fairly rare, easily resolved, and by no means indicative of the update in general. Longtime users will know this type of problem isn’t specific to this iOS version or any other, as similar issues can occur after updating iOS to just about any version, presumably due to some errant process running in the background or a corruption of a preference. It can happen, but it’s easy to fix. If you have more regular complaints about battery performance, consider following some general advice to boost battery life in iOS 7.