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iPhone 6s Plus posts excellent battery life, matches the Galaxy Note5 to the minute

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iPhone 6s Plus posts excellent battery life, matches the Galaxy Note5 to the minute
* UPDATE: Recharging time benchmark added!

Never one to bet on specs, Apple always omits a few key details of its iPhones, including the capacity of the cells powering them. Thankfully, it doesn't take long for the industry to disassemble a unit and read the label, and on the iPhone 6s Plus it reads 165 mAh less than on its predecessor's: 2,750 mAh. Naturally, then, we were expecting the 6s Plus to score in the 6-hour plus ballpark, about the same as the iPhone 6 Plus. We couldn't have been more wrong.

33,060 seconds. Or 551 minutes. Or 9 hours and 11 minutes. No matter how you slice it, the score that the iPhone 6s Plus achieved on our proprietary battery benchmark is impressive, which is a first for an iPhone in our database. As if to prove a point, the 6s Plus clocked the exact same figure as Samsung's shiny new Galaxy Note5, which boasts a slightly larger, 3,000 mAh cell. An excellent showing.

This achievement definitely comes as a surprise, as Apple actually reported identical numbers of standby, talk time, and video and music playback for the 6s Plus when compared with its predecessor. Obviously, these numbers have failed to capture internal optimizations that the company has carried out, and we'll be reaching out to Apple to try and find out what they are. In the meantime, we can't help but wonder if the iPhone 6s Plus holds any other, as pleasant surprises.

Battery life(hours)Higher is better
Apple iPhone 6s Plus9h 11 min(Good)
Apple iPhone 6 Plus6h 32 min(Average)
Samsung Galaxy Note59h 11 min(Good)
Google Nexus 67h 53 min(Average)
LG G46h 6 min(Poor)
Sony Xperia Z3+7h 15 min(Average)
Motorola DROID Turbo10h 42 min(Excellent)
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+9h 29 min(Good)
OnePlus 26h 38 min(Average)
View all

So battery life's all good, but do we dare say quick charging with Apple's new phablet darling? Unfortunately, the results from our charge test say "No" loud and clear. At 165 minutes, the iPhone 6s Plus is preeeetty slow to raise from the dead and get to full capacity, and so is decisively outdone by competing Android handsets.

Full Charge(hours)Lower is better
Apple iPhone 6s Plus2h 45 min
Apple iPhone 6 Plus2h 51 min
Samsung Galaxy Note51h 21 min
Google Nexus 61h 38 min
LG G42h 7 min
Sony Xperia Z3+3h 9 min
Motorola DROID Turbo2h 6 min
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+1h 20 min
OnePlus 22h 30 min
View all


Thumbnail image courtesy of iFixit
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Chris P. Mobile tech review journalist
Chris Panayotov is a former mobile tech reviewer of phones, tablets and wearables at PhoneArena. However, his contribution to PhoneArena content includes not just reviews, but all kinds of regular and experimental features, such as news stories, buying guides, and an exclusive column on the most notable phones out of Asia.

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