About Optimized Battery Charging on your Apple Watch
With Optimized Battery Charging, your Apple Watch learns from your daily charging habits to improve the lifespan of your battery. And supported Apple Watch models offer additional battery charge optimizations with Optimized Charge Limit.
Battery lifespan
A battery's lifespan is related to its chemical age, which is more than just the length of time since the battery was assembled. A battery's chemical age results from a complex combination of several factors, including temperature history and charging pattern.
All rechargeable batteries are consumable components that become less effective as they chemically age. As lithium-ion batteries chemically age, the amount of charge they can hold diminishes, resulting in reduced battery life and reduced peak performance.
Learn more about Apple Watch battery and performance and how to maximize battery performance and lifespan.
How Optimized Battery Charging works
With watchOS 7 and later, your Apple Watch learns from your daily charging habits to improve the lifespan of your battery. This feature, called Optimized Battery Charging, is designed to reduce the wear on your battery and improve its lifespan by reducing the time your Apple Watch spends fully charged. Optimized Battery Charging is on by default when you set up your Apple Watch or after updating to watchOS 7 or later.
When the feature is turned on, your watch delays charging past 80% in certain situations. In these situations, the watch's battery level remains between 75% and 80%. Your watch uses on-device machine learning to learn your daily charging routine so that Optimized Battery Charging activates only when your watch predicts it will be connected to a charger for an extended period of time. The algorithm aims to ensure that your Apple Watch is still fully charged when you remove it from the charger.
You can make your watch charge to full before it's scheduled to do so:
Make sure that your Apple Watch is connected to its charger.
Tap your watch to show the charging screen, then tap the circle with the green or yellow charging icon
.Tap Charge to Full Now.
Your Apple Watch takes time to learn your charging patterns before it uses Optimized Battery Charging. If your Apple Watch is new, or if you recently updated to watchOS 7 or later, the charging screen will say Charging to full.
If you want to turn off Optimized Battery Charging:
Open the Settings app on your Apple Watch.
Scroll down, then tap Battery.
Tap Battery Health.
Turn off Optimized Battery Charging.
Choose Turn Off Until Tomorrow or Turn Off.
If you have Apple Watch Ultra, Optimized Battery Charging is always on.
Optimized Charge Limit on Apple Watch
In addition to Optimized Battery Charging, supported Apple Watch models offer Optimized Charge Limit. With watchOS 10, this feature is available on Apple Watch SE, Apple Watch Series 6 and later, and Apple Watch Ultra and later. Optimized Charge Limit learns from your daily usage to determine when to charge to an optimized limit and when to allow a full charge. Optimized Charge Limit is on by default when you set up your Apple Watch.
With Optimized Charge Limit active, an open charge ring appears when you connect your Apple Watch to its charger. If you want to charge your watch beyond the optimized limit, follow these steps:
Make sure that your Apple Watch is connected to its charger.
Tap your watch to show the charging screen, then tap the circle with the green or yellow charging icon
.Tap Charge to Full Now.
Your Apple Watch takes time to learn your charging patterns before it uses Optimized Battery Charging or Optimized Charge Limit. If your Apple Watch is new, the charging screen will say Charging to full. Optimized Charge Limit changes dynamically depending on how you use your Apple Watch. Based on your usage patterns, your watch might charge to 100% on some days, and less on others.
Turning off Optimized Charge Limit can increase wear on your battery and reduce its lifespan.
To turn off Optimized Charge Limit on Apple Watch Series 9 or Apple Watch Ultra and later:
Open the Settings app on your watch.
Scroll down, then tap Battery.
Tap Battery Health.
Turn off Optimized Charge Limit.
Choose Turn Off Until Tomorrow or Turn Off.
On Apple Watch SE, Series 6, Series 7, and Series 8, turning off Optimized Battery Charging also turns off Optimized Charge Limit.
Optimized Battery Charging activates only in certain locations
Optimized charging is designed to activate only in locations where you spend the most time, such as your home and place of work. The feature doesn't turn on when your usage habits are more variable, such as when you travel.
Turning on these location settings in the Settings app on your Apple Watch can help Optimized Battery Charging identify situations where it shouldn't be used:
Privacy & Security > Location Services > Location Services
Privacy & Security > Location Services > System Services > System Customization
Privacy & Security > Location Services > System Services > Significant Locations > Significant Locations
None of the location information for this feature is sent to Apple.
