Today Apple has released the iOS 16 beta 5 today and this comes to the long-awaited return of battery percentage to the status bar. Unfortunately, it’s hideous as hell and unreadable.
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Previously, the battery percentage appeared to the left of the battery icon. In the recent past, when the iPhone X was launched that had a notch, Apple removed it starting with the iPhone X because there wasn’t enough space to cram it at the top bar. To find out battery percentage, you currently have to swipe down to Control Center. In iOS 16, Apple’s “solved” that issue by having the figure appear within the battery icon.
To see the new icon in the iOS16 beta, you have to go to the Battery menu in Settings and flip on the Battery Percentage toggle. The option also appears to be unavailable on the iPhone 11, iPhone 12 mini, and iPhone 13 mini. This might change with future beta releases, but them’s the breaks for now.)
The downside here is that because the number appears within the battery icon, it has to appear fully charged at all times for readability. So even if you’ve got a paltry 10 percent battery left on your phone, the icon itself still looks full. In the few hours I’ve had this feature on, it’s admittedly caused my brain to short circuit. A full battery icon that reads 55? That just borks the visual cues we’ve all become accustomed to.
The whole purpose of the battery icon on iOS16 and beyond is to understand quickly, at a glance, how much juice you have left. Unfortunately, the “full” battery plus the teeny tiny numbers aren’t easy on the eyes, especially on a white background. That’s especially true if your vision is poor. It doesn’t help that it’s always been hard to read the status bar. Of course, not everyone will have this issue. If you have 20/20 vision, it likely won’t bother you much.
