Update: Apple has denied a report that it might launch a battery-replacement program to cover its iPhone 6 handsets.
The exact reason for the supposed battery-exchange initiative wasn’t revealed in Makotakara’s post, which was short on details. But the now-debunked rumor made it sound like Apple might expand the battery-replacement program in place for certain iPhone 6s handsets due to a fault that causes the units to randomly shut down.
“We constantly evaluate service statistics,” an anonymous Apple source told Apple Insider. “There are no plans or grounds for a wide iPhone 6 battery exchange program at this time.”
When the random shutdown issue came to light last year, Apple said the problem related to only a small quantity of iPhone 6s units produced between September and October 2015. The company committed to replacing those phones for any customers who had experienced the fault.
Apple later acknowledged that a “small number of customers outside of the affected range have also reported an unexpected shutdown,” without releasing details. The company also issued an iOS update containing an additional diagnostic capability for tracking down the root of the problem.
To its credit, Apple has never been sniffy about sorting out problems related to its products, even when these emerge later — and the devices are therefore out of warranty. In the meantime, though, we’ll wait and see whether Makotakara’s report turns out to have any validity to it.
Has your iPhone exhibited this random shutdown behavior? Leave a comment below. We’ve also reached out to Apple to ask about a possible expansion of their battery replacement program.
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
52 responses to “Apple denies it will launch battery-replacement program for iPhone 6”
Yep, mine has. But this time it’s too little too late for uncle Apple. I’m switching to a high end Android phone which is easy to repair when necessary, with a replaceable battery.
I’m almost right there with you. I so badly want a device with a SD card and a removable battery. :/
Give it a rest with the removable battery unless you want a plastic phone.
Why would the phone have to be plastic? The LGV20 is not plastic.
I wouldn’t mind it being plastic… I seemed to have survived the 3G okay… ;)
Enjoy your Android
I have yet to get one actually. Hence the *almost*.
Honestly I don’t get why people are so polorized one way or another. It’s a damn phone for crying out loud.
Good bye
Easier to repair? I work as a phone repair tech at Batteries + bulbs and I can guarantee you, if you want to buy a phone to keep a long time and repair, the iphone is cheaper and easier to repair than any samsung phone. LG phones are basically impossible to repair. Cheers!
My 6 has done it a bunch of times. I’m glad to hear this. Maybe if I go into the Apple Store and complain it would at least be another one logged in and hey they might even replace it haha.
I’m using a 6s now that luckily doesn’t have the same issue as many 6s users have reported.
My 6s has random shutdowns, twice this week, but my serial number is not on the recall list. After I plug it in it restarts and goes back to the previous battery level at shutdown.
I have exactly the same problem with my out_of_apple_serials iPhone 6S!!!!!
I too have the problem. The meter reads 41% then next opening it drops to 5%. I have found that you do not even have to pug in the charger just the lightening cable and it hops back to 41%. Apple’s tests have been unable to find the problem, probably because it is intermittent.
my 6 plus will go from 30% to shut off in about a minute…
Mine has also. Usually when my battery reaches 30% but many times before that. Disconcerting when your phone has shut down and when you plug it back in it shows 60% battery.
Same issue for me as well. Even with location services turned off the battery will drain rapidly to around 30%, shut down, and cannot be turned back on until it’s attached to a charging source. Then it will power up and show 30% charge immediately and recharge at an absurdly fast rate. I’m going to try replacing the battery myself in case that’s the cause (iPhone 6, 25 months old)
My iphone6 shuts down after showing a fully charged battery to dead while I am on a call. This is completely wrong it does this at least once a week. I rely on my phone for everything so I need it fixed or replaced. I pay for the insurance monthly so they have my extra money there. HELP
“To its credit, Apple has never been sniffy about sorting out problems related to its products”
lol, when the iPhone 4 had problems apple blamed the users.
When iPhones blew up and killed people apple blamed their chargers.
With touch disease, apple refuses to fix it.
With these batteries, they blamed the manufacturer.
Why no recall? Clearly there are defects in the 6 models and untold numbers are affected.
So true. Apple have ZERO credit here. They have done themselves no favours on this one. They have obviously calculated that the bad press they get from accepting they screwed up outweighs losing some customers. Until this story gets wider exposure I have a bad feeling they are just going to ignore it.
Yeah, My iPhone 6s Plus and my previous iPhone 5s always shuts down when it’s 45 degrees or below outside. It happens even if they are fully charged and only outside of your pocket for a few seconds. Occasionally you can get it to turn on again only to shut down seconds later.
I would switch to Android if I wasn’t so heavily invested in Apple’s ecosystem. I’m super disappointed with Apple as of late with this underwhelming MBP and these annoying upgrade prompts.
Our house’s Apple ecosystem consists of 3 iPads, 4 iPhones, iPods, MacBook pro, IMAC 27 inch, Apple TV box, Airport extreme. I was a bit of a fanboy really! BUT I’m still going to migrate if I don’t get a refund for the battery I had to replace. It’s the principle really.
And anyway Apple have been missing a few tricks recently. My new TV is a smart LG TV (what happened to the rumoured full Apple TV?) which means I don’t use my Apple TV box anymore. I now have an Amazon Echo which is just brilliant (Errr Siri, where are you?). I also bought a cheap Amazon Fire tablet which is great for having all my Audible books, Kindle books and Prime content in one place. And don’y get me started on the Apple Watch (all I wanted to do was go for a run, record my run and listen to music without having to take my iPhone with me). Life outside Apple is looking better and better and this battery fiasco may well be the final nudge I need.
Mine shut down so much that I had to BUY another phone! Plugged in it would shut down! Apple said that it was functioning perfectly. Not even close!
My 6 shuts down suddenly at %ages from 22% to 68%. It won’t switch on again without plugging in to a charger at which point it starts up at the %age it shut down at (ie, up to 68%). It is bizarre and it’s only recently started doing it at around 22 months old.
My wife’s iPhone 6 routinely drops from 30% to <10% a couple of times a week.
I have been facing the issue with my iPHONE 6 and struggled to convince Apple online support couple of times. However, they refused to change the battery as they do not believe that iPHONE 6 would have an issue with battery. I am seriously facing drowning with battery unexpectedly as well sudden restart of the phone even I am on battery with any percentage (i.e whether I am 10% or 50% or 75% or 85 %). I have seen serious issue and reported to Apple support which they said it can be evaluated in Engineering which process can take week to few weeks to understand the issue. I’ve tried to convince them that this symptoms are similar to iPHONE 6 and it has happened since Apple role out new iOS last September. Thank you!
My iPhone6 has had the sudden drop or sudden shut off problem. I ended up replacing the battery with a generic one, but the problem persisted. It seems to happen less now after I did a few full recharge cycles to recalibrate. I think it’s an OS issue that Apple will hopefully fix with 10.2.1.
I also don’t expect Apple to issue a replacement recall for a device two generations old (unless it’s a danger, like exploding batteries).
My iPhone6 has shown similar issues recently, such the battery discharging in a record amount of time with little or no use. Hmmmm.
Yes i have same problem ….after 30 % some time 20 % it shutdown
Yes my 6s also doing this. Also not in the recall list. Worst one was when the battery level was at 43% and it shut down on me, cheekily showing the battery with thin red line… As soon as I connected it to the charger and when it came back on it was at 42%. It seems to happen more frequently recently…
Mine also had this problem exactly 13 months after purchase. Thankfully my credit card reimbursed the replacement cost as they double the manufacturer warranty. Edit: (I have 6s Plus)
My iPhone 6 was suffering from this a couple of months ago. I took it in to my local Apple Store where they ran a couple of diagnostics. They replaced the battery free of charge, even though my phone is out of warranty. No problems since. I would suggest anyone with this problem try this as a first step before doing anything drastic, such as switching to Android!
Pretty inconsistent approach then from Apple. I very reluctantly paid £69 to have my battery replaced at a UK Apple store. I did however ensure that the Apple ‘Genius’ guy recorded that customer thinks this to 10.1 upgrade so that if they do a recall I might have a chance of a refund. The cheeky thing is that you know they know there’s an issue but they write ‘customer thinks’.
Until they refund me my next phone will not be an iPhone. The new Google Pixel looks very tempting!
You were lucky that Apple replaced free of charge out of warranty. For me they reset the phone, erased all data and later suggested to upgrade my phone to higher version by paying extra.
I have had my new battery (replaced by the recall) for a month on my 6s. I have been destructively testing it by running it down to 0% every day.
Today it did exactly the same as my first failed battery.
I am going to carry on testing to see if this carries on.
If it does then back to the Apple Store, so keep your eyes open on your replacement too.
My 6 does have this issue. Clearly this is classic Apply dening reposibility.
Both mine and my wife’s iphone6 are having this issue
Same with my iphone 6. Record discharges and random shutdowns (30%-60%) started happening with OS 10. Chatted with Apple and was told their engineers were looking into it. I let them scan my phone. No joy. Thinking about selling and going to Android. Everybody contact Apple about this!
I had the same problem on my Iphone 6. Called in Apple tech support today, after running diagnostics they basically told me my battery was End of Life and I should replace it.
Does not look like Apple will do the replacement they view this as a natural battery degrade over time.
I was told the same thing earlier this month. They said my phone had done 500 recharge cycles and it was borderline due to fail! What they failed recognise is that only half of those recharges happened in the first 15 months of ownership and the next half were in the 3 months after 10.1 upgrade!
Yes, this happens frequently to my iPhone 6–it also goes from 100% charged to turning off within moments of turning it on in the morning. Then it recharges very quickly. Frustrating!
My 6 Plus was having major battery issues and shutting down constantly. I replaced the battery myself last week. So far, so good.
My 7+ has no issues so far.
Forums I have read suggest that this effects 5S, 6 and 6S mainly.
Yep same problem here. 15 month old iPhone 6 working fine until ios10.1 upgrade fried my battery last september. Rapid discharge and shutdowns. I had no choice but to get battery replaced by Apple.
Apple’s approach to this has been appalling. I’m not buying another Apple product until they refund me for the battery. Hope that will be included in any future replacement program
Yep, mine starts to rapidly lose battery between 30-50% and then shuts off within a few minutes. I bought a battery case so i could continue using it. It’s been doing it for around 6 months now.
my neighbors 6s plus is switching off, my 6 was switching off and now my 6s is misbehaving the same way.. as soon as the temperature goes below 13 degrees centigrade and battery is under 50% it switches off!
with my 6 i went to apple store (in amsterdam, ‘cos there is no apple store in my country) and their explanation was that “argus” app was the one who was draining the battery and that simple erasing the app won’t help i had to reinstall everything from the scratch, set it up as a new phone, so i did that and sorprise.. that didn’t resolve the problem, so i sold it and bought new 6s set it up as a new iphone and this winter the same story again; and my serial no. is also not on recall list
Feel for ya! But surely the 6s is still under warranty? If you can demonstrate battery drain when it’s had a factory reset then they should 100% replace the iPhone or at least the battery.
iPhone batteries are not hard to replace yourself.
Yes, mine has repeatedly shut down after taking photos, when I had 40% on my phone. It has been awful. I feel like it’s apple’s way of making me upgrade my phone when there was nothing wrong with it until I updated to ios 10. I don’t know if I can get a new battery to fix the issue, but feel Apple should replace the battery for all iphone 6 users. This is ridiculous. I will not purchase another apple product.
Yes. It is doing it several times a day now!
Hi, I´m from Brazil. I am facing drowning with battery unexpectedly as well sudden restart of the phone even I am on battery with any percentage. My wife has the same iphone model and don´t upgrade to IOS 10.2, her iphone is working well, no battery issue.
I have My I phone 6 since 14 month and it started shutdown randomly when the battery reach 30 or 20 percent, it happened around 8 times the past 2 months