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iPhone battery drain, overheating being caused by YouTube’s iOS app

Published Nov 13th, 2017 7:16PM EST
iPhone YouTube App
Image: YouTube

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As excited as Apple fans are about having the latest and greatest hardware and software, it’s important to remember that the first version of anything is going to have its issues. Such is the case for iOS 11.1.1, which Apple rolled out late last week to fix the bug that was turning the capital letter “I” into a strange symbol. The good news is that the update fixed the bug in question, but an even more worrisome issue appears to have sprung up in its place.

On Monday, tech blog PiunikaWeb was one of the first sites to report that many iPhone users who had updated to iOS 11.1.1 were experiencing severe battery drain and overheating when using the YouTube iOS app, even when running it in the background. Dozens of users back up this claim on Twitter, Reddit and elsewhere.

Based on the timing of some of the tweets and several posts on the MacRumors forum, the issue has been around for some users since at least the release of iOS 11.1. The good news is that YouTube is aware of the problem, as at least one user who complained about battery drain on Twitter received a response from YouTube’s Twitter account:

At the time of writing, the YouTube app has not yet been updated to address this issue, but we imagine the developers will be working quickly to release a fix. In the meantime, be careful about using the YouTube app if you’re out and about and need to conserve some battery. You could end up with a dead phone.

Jacob Siegal
Jacob Siegal Associate Editor

Jacob Siegal is Associate Editor at BGR, having joined the news team in 2013. He has over a decade of professional writing and editing experience, and helps to lead our technology and entertainment product launch and movie release coverage.