What’s the Battery Life of the New iPhone Air? Here’s What Apple Says

At the ‘Awe Dropping' event on Tuesday, Apple announced its new iPhone 17 series with incremental upgrades over the iPhone 16. Like previous years, the latest lineup from the Cupertino-based tech giant includes four new models — iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, and an all-new iPhone Air. While the Pro models usually garner all the headlines after an Apple event, it is the iPhone Air this year that has become the talk of the town. Apple claims it to be the slimmest smartphone to date, coming in at 5.6mm.

However, there is precedent for phones with ultra-slim designs struggling in terms of delivering adequate battery life. So, what about the iPhone Air? This is what Apple has to say.

iPhone Air: How is the Battery Life?

Apple says the iPhone Air delivers an “all-day” battery life. But what does this exactly mean? As per the technical specifications, the iPhone Air comes with a built-in rechargeable lithium-ion battery, which provides up to 27 hours of video playback and up to 22 hours when streamed, on a single charge.

This means the iPhone Air has a slightly reduced battery life than the standard iPhone 17, which is rated for up to 30 hours of video playback.

To further reduce concerns about battery life on the iPhone Air, the tech giant introduced a new MagSafe battery pack specifically for the handset, priced at $99 (roughly Rs. 8,700). With this, Apple claims the handset's battery delivers up to 40 hours of video playback on a single charge.

However, keeping this attached to the iPhone Air at all times eliminates the purpose of having a phone with an ultra-slim profile.

On paper, the iPhone Air has a 3,149mAh battery, which puts it significantly lower than its competitor in the ultra-slim smartphones space, which is the Galaxy S25 Edge. The latter is equipped with a 3,900mAh battery.

Interestingly, the battery life of the iPhone Air is on par with the iPhone 16 Plus, at least on paper, which is also claimed to deliver up to 27 hours of video playback.

In the Gadgets 360 review of the iPhone 16 Plus, we found it to be a dark horse in terms of battery performance, topping even the iPhone 16 Pro Max multiple times in terms of screen time. The handset managed 27 hours and 20 minutes of playback time in our HD video loop test.

Based on sheer numbers claimed by Apple, the iPhone Air could deliver a battery life close to that of the iPhone 16 Plus. But does it perform that well? Stay tuned for our iPhone Air review to find out. Meanwhile, you can read more about the iPhone Air here.