The last couple of generations of iPhones delight with battery life – often, Pro Max lives for two days. Apple has achieved this level of autonomy thanks to a unique L-shaped battery and a smaller motherboard. Still, the company did not stop there and filed two new patents that could potentially extend future iPhones’ battery life.
The first patent, called “Battery in a metal case”, allows you to reduce the gap between the battery and the rest of the smartphone by placing the latter in a hard or semi-rigid case. This allows you to reduce the space around the battery, which is in modern iPhones, thereby increasing its capacity without the risk of puncture or damage due to various components of the smartphone around.
The second patent is intended to extend battery life and is called “Methods for Determining and Controlling Battery Expansion.” During use, due to the degradation of Li-ion, batteries can “swell”, which can damage the smartphone and even explode. Apple proposes to equip the batteries with a special expansion detector. If the latter detects the battery’s excessive swelling, it will send a command about this to the charge controller to limit the maximum battery capacity. It may also warn the user that it is time to replace the battery.