Modern iPads (released from 2024 onwards) now support the built-in battery health features, similar to modern iPhones. At the time of this writing, you can find these features in the iPad Pro (M4), iPad Air (M2), and the iPad Mini (A17 Pro).

Navigate to Settings -> Battery -> Battery Health to view your available options.

Battery Health

This section details whether your device’s remaining battery health is “normal” by Apple’s standards. All lithium-ion batteries, like those in iPads, will degrade over time regardless of what you do. Once the battery can no longer retain 80% of its original charge capacity, this section will display the text “Service Required”.

Maximum Capacity

The Maximum Capacity section details the maximum amount of battery capacity remaining in your device’s battery.

Cycle Count

This section displays the amount of charge cycles your iPad’s battery has gone through. Apple defines a charge cycle as discharging 100% of the device’s battery. This does not need to happen in a single session or day. For example, if you use 50% of your battery one day, 25% the next day, and 25% the following day, your battery has now gone through one charge cycle. The fewer charge cycles a battery generally correlates to having a higher charge capacity remaining on the battery.

80% Limit

iPads now support a feature that lets you limit the maximum charge amount of the battery to 80% of its total capacity. Why would you want to do this? Doesn’t it make more sense to use the full capacity of your battery? (I say yes.)

The theory is that a lithium-ion battery doesn’t like to be completely full. Charging it to 100% puts more stress on the battery and causes it to degrade faster (supposedly). If the charge stops at 80%, you get a useful amount of battery to use, while reducing battery stress and extending battery lifetime.

Manufacture Information

Both the manufacture and first use dates are displayed at the bottom of the Battery Health page. The manufacture date is particularly useful in the case of a battery-related recall. Affected batteries are often identified by when the battery was produced.

What If I Don’t Have A Supported iPad?

iPads released before 2024 won’t have the built-in Battery Health feature. The options available for these devices will likely involve using a Mac or PC. One popular option is an app called CoconutBattery, which can give you detailed battery information about your iPad, as well as your Mac or iPhone.