Battery Life

What is the iPad Mini 5’s battery life like?

• Apple claims you’ll get 10 hours of mixed use, including video watching and web browsing. This matched with our tests
• Battery life hasn’t moved on much though and remains roughly the same as older models
• It charges via Lightning and comes with a slightly more powerful charger than the iPhone XS

While phones like the Huawei P30 Pro have taken battery life to the next level, tablets have remained fairly steady for a number of years now. The iPad Mini 5 doesn’t offer anything different in terms of endurance and matches the 11-inch iPad Pro and 9.7-inch iPad.

Apple claims you’ll get 10 hours of mixed use – this includes a bit of video watching, browsing and the like – and this number seems very true. Over the two week testing period I have found the iPad will easily last a couple of days with moderate use and excellent standby times mean it can sit on your bag or on a coffee table without depleting.

iPad Mini 5 battery performance: Video

The iPad Mini 5 has a small (for a tablet) 7.9-inch LCD panel with a ‘Retina’ resolution of 2048 x 1536. It boasts the most pixel-dense screen of any of the iPads.

iPads in general are excellent for lasting impressively when video is playing and the Mini 5 is no exception. An hour of Netflix streamed video with the screen set to 50% ate through between 6-9%, with a downloaded video of the same length taking the battery down 5-7%.

iPad Mini 5 battery performance: Games

Gaming is always going to put a bigger strain on the battery than video streaming. However, it remains good and in-line

The iPad Mini 5 consumed roughly 10% per hour playing games such as Asphalt 9, and 7% in simpler titles such as Monument Valley 2 or Alto’s Odyssey.

iPad Mini 5 battery performance: Charging

Apple might have swapped to USB-C for the iPad Pro, but the Mini retains the same Lightning port as the previous iPads and all of Apple’s current iPhones. This is great if you’re fully entrenched in Apple’s ecosystem, but not so much if you’re looking for that USB-C future.

With the included charger and cable the iPad Mini 5 takes over three hours to fully charge; you’re looking at just under 90 minutes to get to 50%.