Battery Life of IPhone On Cellular Data and Personal Hot Spot Mode?

paulyron · May 25

I have an iphone 13 mini that is over 2 years ago. The screen needs to be replaced as I have a green vertical line on my phone. It then has a white vertical line. The battery seems to be around 86% or so.

I use my iphone a lot when I don't have internet and use my laptop so I turn on cellular data on and turn on the personal hotspot and then connect to the hotspot on my laptop. Assuming my phone battery is 100% and I have personal hotspot on and I am using my laptop, it seems on average to use about 14% of battery per hour. This seems to be the case when I have it on low power mode but if it's not on that mode, it's 15% or a little more? Thus it doesn't make that much of a difference? The other thing I noticed was whether I'm using a lot of data while on hotspot mode... say what I'm doing... I also play a youtube video during that hour... obviously that would use a ton of more data than if not... it still uses about 14% of battery per hour? Is that normal? I would have though it would use a bit more but from the test I done, that doesn't seem to be the case? So you can get close to 7 hours of battery almost on the iphone 13 mini while on personal hotspot?
Now what if you are on your cellular data on your phone the whole time instead of connecting a laptop to hotspot? I got to assume it's a little bit longer than 7 hours or it's about the same?

What I do on my laptop when I need internet but I don't have internet and use the cellular data hotspot from my iphone 13 mini, I typically don't use more than 40mb of data per hour which is very little. But say if I have a youtube video running as well, well that could mean another 200-300mb of data so that would mean 340mb of data for that hour. So it seems with a full 100% iphone 13 mini battery, I would get close to 7 hours of battery on my iphone with personal hot spot turned on... would you say that is accurate?

The other issue I have is this. Whenever my iphone battery goes down to 50% or say 20% while I'm on personal hotspot on and using my laptop, I would then charge my iphone. The thing is many times, it would only charge up to 80% and I sometimes get the message it can only charge to that because the iphone is hot. So while using my laptop and using the personal hotspot cellular, the max battery my iphone would go up to is 80%. Is there a way to fix that? Only way would be turn of the cellular data right? However, I can't do that while in the middle of using my laptop. So what I would do is say I charge my iphone to 80% battery while using my laptop, I would then unplug the charger from iphone since 80% would give me roughly 5.5 hours of battery and say if I only need to use laptop with hotspot data for another 5 hours, that would be enough.

Now is this about right with the math I'm using on the battery life of an iphone 13 mini when having cellular data on and personal hotspot on while connecting to the hotspot while using the laptop? So say I need to use my laptop for 8 hours straight with cellular data hotspot. Assume I have no internet access so I have to use the hotspot. What I typically would do is charge my iphone to at least 60% before using the hotspot. Then use the hotspot untii the iphone battery goes to maybe 20% before charging it. So this would mean I been using the hotspot for a bit less than 3 hours. Then I would charge my iphone while using the laptop. Or it could be using the iphone at 100% and using it for 3 hours straight and then charging it then the remaining few hours, I wouldn't even need to charge my iphone while on data because it would have enough battery. At the end, I want it to be where the last 1-2 hours while I'm on the laptop while on personal hotspot data, to not have my iphone charged in the process.

paulyron · May 25

Would this be accurate to those with iphone 13 mini users? Now if my battery maximum capacity was 100%, then it would probably be longer? However, when I got this iphone 13 mini new over 2 years ago, I remember being on my laptop and connecting to the personal hotspot and it seemed to use about 14% of battery every hour. So after the 1st hour, it would drop to 86%. Then 72%. Then 58% etc. So would that be the same even if my battery maximum capacity was 100% as oppose to 86%? But if your battery health maximum capacity was under 80%, it's different? Got to assume it's different if you have an iphone 13 and it's more?

Now people who have an iphone 15 or iphone 15 max or those recent ones with lot of battery, how many hours does your iphone last if you use it as a personal hotspot for your laptop? Is it using about 14% per hour or it uses less? Is it possible to have the iphone 15 pro max to last 10 hours if you have it fully charged to 100% and now turn on cellular data and personal hotspot and just leave your phone on the table and then connect to the hotspot using your laptop? How much % battery does your iphone 15 max drain per hour assuming you were to do this? Would it be 14% or would it be less?

paulyron · May 26

Anyone use their iphone as a personal hotspot for their laptop when they don't have internet access and if so, how many hours does your iphone last before battery goes to 0?

Robchil · May 26

High data transfer are usually one of the reasons draining faster than slower.. except having the screen on with active gaming..

the % of drainage are usually correlated by those facts.. so i'm not really surprised.

I usually just connect my iphone 11 max pro to a charger when using it as hotspot to make it last as it don't need to be in my hand anyway..

Alan G · May 26

To prolong the life of the phone battery you should only charge it to 80% and not 100%. I'm on Android and there is a nifty app called AccuBattery that beeps when the phone reaches that point. It also keeps track of charge/discharge cycles and provides a bunch of other useful information. Don't know if there is an iPhone app that does something similar. As @Robchil points out high data transfer is a big reason for fast discharge. Phone calls and text messaging really don't have much of an impact in my experience. I don't have much experience using the phone as a hot spot as all my work is in my home office on my workstation.