You May Soon Get Money From Apple’s Batterygate Lawsuit
Back in 2020 , Apple agreed to pay $500 million to settle a class-action lawsuit that alleged Apple limited the iPhone’s performance. If you filed a claim before the October 6, 2020 deadline, your portion of the payment should arrive in your bank account soon.
MacRumors was the first to report the news. Many people have started reporting that they received around $92 per claim from Apple, such as this user X (formerly Twitter) and others in the comments to the original report. The amount for one claim is significantly higher than the original $25 per claim. This is because the total settlement amount is divided among all claims. The more people who file a claim, the less payout each person will receive.
Those who do not file a claim are not entitled to these payments, which arrive more than three years after a settlement is reached. To be eligible for the payment, you must have had one of the following eligible devices before December 21, 2017:
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iPhone 6, 6 Plus, 6S, 6S Plus or SE running iOS 10.2.1 or later.
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iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus with iOS 11.2 or later.
This case has its roots in the way iOS managed battery at the time. If your iPhone’s battery condition was poor or if it was unable to supply enough voltage to provide maximum performance, the device would slow down due to throttling. At the time, people were experiencing seemingly random slowdowns on their iPhones, and Apple claimed the feature was introduced to prevent random shutdowns. Older versions of iOS didn’t have the ability to check your battery health and see if any battery issues were causing your performance to slow down.
Apple has since released software updates to better reflect the current health of your iPhone’s battery and inform you of performance degradation. About a year after this issue came to light, Apple was also offering a discounted battery replacement for your iPhone.