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iPhone 16 Pro Max battery test results are in: it's a big upgrade

By Victor Hristov

Updated: Sep 25, 2024, 7:38 AM

27comments

Apple

Battery life might be the most underrated upgrade for the iPhone 16 series, and particularly for the iPhone 16 Pro Max.

Apple claims this is the iPhone with longest battery life ever, but we had to put these claims to the test, and now, after days of extensive testing, we have the results from our battery testing.

At PhoneArena, every phone we review goes through three separate battery tests, where for each one we look at the time it takes to fully drain the phone with a particular use case:

1. Web browsing test – we cycle through a set of webpages with scrolling behavior baked in

2. YouTube video streaming test – we run the same YouTube playlist on all phones

3. 3D Gaming test – we run a 3D game at identical settings on all phones until they are drained

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To understand how good the iPhone 16 Pro Max performs, we pit it against the iPhone 16 Plus, the iPhone 15 Pro Max, and of course the biggest Android rivals including the Galaxy S24 Ultra, S24 Plus, Pixel 9 Pro XL and the OnePlus 12.

Interestingly, despite the notable ugprade in battery size, the iPhone 16 Pro Max battery capacity is still not as big as that of Android phones. Here are the battery sizes for all the phones in this comparison:

iPhone 16 Pro Max – 4685 mAh
iPhone 16 Plus – 4674 mAh
iPhone 15 Pro Max – 4441 mAh
Galaxy S24 Ultra – 5000 mAh
Galaxy S24 Plus – 4900 mAh
Google Pixel 9 Pro XL – 5060 mAh
OnePlus 12 – 5400 mAh

And here are our test results:

PhoneArena Battery Test #1: Web Browsing

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This is the lightest of our three tests, shows how the iPhone 16 Pro Max has improved a great deal compared to its predecessor, but it also crushes the Android competition.

Compared to the 15 Pro Max from last year, the new iPhone scores nearly three hours more, which is a very good improvement.

PhoneArena Battery Test #2: YouTube Video Streaming

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For YouTube video streaming, the OnePlus 12 dominates the test, but the iPhone 16 Pro Max and iPhone 16 Plus are the closest followers with pretty solid results as well.

Galaxy phones typically underperform and drain faster than others with YouTube videos, and we still don't know the reason for that, but it's a consistent trend that we have observed throughout the years. Optimizing this one aspect of their performance would be a really welcome improvement.

PhoneArena Battery Test #3: 3D Gaming

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The Galaxy S24 Ultra manages to win the gaming test as it seems most efficient when it comes to GPU usage.

The iPhone 16 Pro Max, however, ranks second ones again.

Summary and Total Battery Use estimate

Overall, the iPhone 16 Pro Max is one of the biggest battery upgrades in years, and while we are still waiting for Apple Intelligence, the longer battery life might actually be the biggest reason to convince some users to buy the new model.

And here is our final battery use estimate for all the phones in this comparison:

Battery Life

Charging

Phone	Battery Life estimate	Browsing	Video
Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max 4685 mAh	8h 30min	22h 39min	10h 24min
OnePlus 12 5400 mAh	8h 23min	18h 14min	13h 37min
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra 5000 mAh	7h 39min	20h 6min	8h 18min
Apple iPhone 16 Plus 4674 mAh	7h 31min	18h 5min	10h 24min
Samsung Galaxy S24+ 4900 mAh	7h 31min	20h 41min	8h 20min
Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max 4422 mAh	7h 26min	19h 20min	9h 45min
Google Pixel 9 Pro XL 5060 mAh	7h 18min	18h 52min	9h 24min

Phone	Full Charging		30 min Charge
	Wired	Wireless	Wired	Wireless
OnePlus 12 5400 mAh	0h 37min	Untested	89%	Untested
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra 5000 mAh	1h 9min	1h 58min	68%	33%
Samsung Galaxy S24+ 4900 mAh	1h 9min	1h 57min	61%	31%
Google Pixel 9 Pro XL 5060 mAh	1h 23min	Untested	63%	Untested
Apple iPhone 16 Plus 4674 mAh	1h 34min	1h 58min	59%	42%
Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max 4685 mAh	1h 42min	1h 58min	57%	42%
Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max 4422 mAh	2h 1min	2h 36min	53%	29%

Find out more details about battery and charging for all phones we have tested on our PhoneArena Battery Score page

View Full Bio

Victor, a seasoned mobile technology expert, has spent over a decade at PhoneArena, exploring the depths of mobile photography and reviewing hundreds of smartphones across Android and iOS ecosystems. His passion for technology, coupled with his extensive knowledge of smartphone cameras and battery life, has positioned him as a leading voice in the mobile tech industry.