There are increasing reports of an AirPods Max battery drain issue on Apple Support Forums, Reddit and elsewhere. Some owners are reporting that their headphones’ battery is draining from 100% to 1% or 0% overnight, even when left inside the official Apple case designed to quickly put them in ultra low power mode.
Others are reporting drainage not exactly in the same league, but still dramatically higher than would be expected …
Dutch website AppleTips spotted the reports.
More and more AirPods Max owners are complaining about battery problems. Users discuss the problem on Reddit, social media, the Apple support forum and several other forums. For example, if the battery runs out during the day without using AirPods Max.
A Smart Case is provided with the headphones, when you place the Max in the case, the power saving mode is activated and the active connections are disconnected. In practice, this does not seem to be the case, and the battery life runs out over night. 100% to 1% is not uncommon.
From the Apple Support Forums:
“My AirPods Max discharge deeply during the night. They go from 90% + to 0 overnight. “
“Yes, exactly the same problem here. I fully charge my Airpods Max, carefully place them in the Apple case (which should put them in ‘low power mode’), and then when I use them a few hours later or the next day, they do the ‘death sound’ indicating that the battery is low and I see that the battery has dropped to 1%. It is not the behavior I expect in a $ 549 pair of headphones. ”
And Reddit:
“Charge them up to 100% in the morning and use them occasionally (2-3 hours) during the day and at night, put them in the smart box. Wake up to 0% of the battery. “
“Yes, even here. Although I used mine for an entire night. Even so, when I woke up this morning, 1% of the battery was left. “
AppleTips claims to have direct experience with the problem with his own headphones.
The AirPods Max was stored at 96% in the Smart Case at around 7pm. The next morning, the battery percentage dropped to just 1% and the headphones could no longer be used. This is not an occasional problem, but a recurring one. This makes it almost impossible to use the AirPods Max the next day because they need to be charged first.
The problem may have been introduced with a firmware update released on December 18, as most reports are after that date.
AppleTips says the problem does not appear to occur when the headphones are used only with an iPhone, but when they are connected to an Apple TV or non-Apple device. There still doesn’t seem to be any consistent fix, but several different things have worked for some of those affected.
- Force AirPods Max to restart by pressing and holding the digital crown and the noise control button until the orange light appears.
- Restore AirPods Max to factory settings by doing the above and continuing to hold both until the status light turns white.
- Manually disconnect the AirPods Max connection after use through your device’s Bluetooth settings.
- Disable automatic switching by device.
- For now, use Max with a device, for example, your iPhone.
Apple was criticized for the fact that the headphones do not have an on / off button and must be stored inside the unpopular Smart Case to put them in low power mode. However, Apple later said that using the case makes very little difference.
It is not the first problem reported with AirPods Max: some owners have reported a condensation problem inside the headphones.
Did you experience unusual battery consumption on the AirPods Max? Please let us know in the comments.
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