If you remember, Apple got into a little trouble recently when it was discovered they were throttling iPhones without their customers’ knowledge. So much trouble, they have quite a few lawsuits on their hands.
Because of the PR nightmare, Apple announced they would include a way for you to check and see if your iPhone was being throttled and even give you a way to stop the throttling if your iPhone seemed slow. True to their word, they added that feature in the latest major update to iOS. But how do you check if you are a victim of iPhone throttling? If you are, how do you turn it off? Today, we will look at exactly what you need to do to check your iPhone and disable the throttling.
What iPhones are Throttled?
First, you need to know if you should even bother checking in the first place. So what iPhones are subject to the throttling? Currently, they are:
- iPhone SE
- iPhone 6
- iPhone 6 Plus
- iPhone 6S
- iPhone 6S Plus
- iPhone 7
- iPhone 7 Plus
So, unless you are the owner of a really old iPhone that can’t take the latest iOS updates or you are the proud owner of an iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus, or iPhone X, you have to worry about it. So what do you do? I will show you.
What is iPhone Throttling?
So what is iPhone throttling, you ask? It’s pretty simple. When your iPhone detects that your battery has degraded, even a little bit, the software automatically throttles your iPhone. That means that the software artificially slows down your iPhone so it doesn’t run at its top performance. The idea is that the iPhone will then perform decently but it won’t shut down on you unexpectedly due to your battery degradation.
Now that sounds all well and good on paper. But the end result is that your iPhone may seem slower or sluggish while you are using it, and that’s not a good thing. What’s even worse is that Apple didn’t bother telling anybody that they did it, and for awhile there was no way you could tell if it was happening or not. That’s why they got in so much trouble with the throttling in the first place.
But now, you can see if your iPhone is being throttled thanks to the latest update in iOS. I will show you how to check if your iPhone is throttled and how you can disable it so your phone doesn’t slow down just because your battery has lost a little of its juice.
Disable Throttling
To check and then disable throttling, follow these easy steps.
- Tap on Settings.
- Tap on the Battery
- Select Battery Health (Beta).
On the following screen, you will see the maximum battery capacity of your iPhone. If the battery capacity is at 80% or your iPhone has unexpectedly shutdown, you will see the following message: “…performance management has been applied to prevent this from happening again.”
So what does that mean? That means you have fallen victim to iPhone throttling either because the battery of your iPhone has degraded or because there was an unexpected shutdown. But now you will also see a choice to turn CPU throttling off. Turn it off and your iPhone will run at full power again.
Now remember, if your phone has another unexpected shutdown after you have turned this off, your iPhone will automatically turn this “feature” on again. So you will have to revisit these settings and disable it once again. Unfortunately, at the time of this writing there is no way to disable it permanently no matter what your iPhone does. Perhaps an update in the future?
Of course, if you keep experiencing the problem, you can always visit Apple and get a new battery for your device for only $29. You must make an appointment and take your iPhone to the closest Apple store to do it.
Parting Thoughts
Apple got quite a bit of bad press on this “feature”, and rightly so. They should have let their customers know what they were doing from the beginning. But at least now there is a way to disable the feature, even if it will annoyingly come back on if your iPhone shuts down on you.
What do you think about this new feature? Should Apple do more or is it fine the way it is? Tell me your thoughts in the comments below.
