How do I tell from looking at the Batter Usage metric in Xcode Organizer if I'm in good shape?

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Created 1d

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This post is from the WWDC26 Power & Performance Q&A.

I'm having trouble knowing whether my app is in good shape for battery usage by looking at the Battery Usage pane in Xcode's Organizer. I have some questions:

At the top under "On-Screen Battery Usage", it says "Normalized to the usage of the most recent version when unplugged (x minutes / day)". Is the number there represented by "x" how long users tend to have my app open per day?
When looking at the colored segments of the usage, I'm showing "Display" as 85% or more of the area. Is that just the cost of keeping the display turned on? Does it go up or down based on things like animations, displaying complex images, etc?

It would be great to have an example of some apps of different types that are good "battery usage" citizens and what their battery usage looks like on this screen.

Answer 1

Engineer OP

Apple

1d

Hi Mr. Jefferson, thanks for reaching out! I am happy to share the answers below:

"x" refers to the time that the app is in the foreground and the device isn’t connected to power, for the most recent version of your app.
The "display" portion of the block is impacted by display power usage by ProMotion devices. Display power can be influenced in two primary ways: display luminance and display refresh rate.
- First, the lower the luminance of the display, the lower the display power. Having a dark mode for users who desire it will allow the app to have better display power characteristics.
- Second, the lower the refresh rate of the display, the lower the display power. A game that runs at 60Hz will have better display power characteristics than one that runs at 120Hz. Additionally, pausing the display when nothing on screen is animating or refreshing will reduce power further. SwiftUI and UIKit manage and minimize refresh rate automatically. Please refer to this documentation to learn more.
We can certainly give you more insight into where you should aim to be with respect to apps that are technically and functionally similar to yours. If your app has sufficient data and is eligible for a goal, you will see a dashed line in the metrics chart histogram. This provides a clear target for your app to aim for based on those similar apps or your own historical performance. Please refer to the Xcode Organizer goals documentation for more details.

Thank you!