Apple says the iPhone 17 Pro Max has “all day battery life,” and I’m sure that’s true for some people—but I wanted to test it the way I actually use my phone. In this video, I do a real-world battery drain day: checking notifications, using my phone for yoga videos, filming TikToks, taking calls at a cafe, running errands, shopping, and walking around for hours. I share battery check-ins throughout the day so you can see how it drops with realistic, heavy usage. By the time I got to the cafe I was at 83%, and after a couple hours of calls and work I was down to 62%—and that was without charging. Later, after errands and a long day out, I was at 57%, and the evening is where it really started to drop fast: YouTube while doing a kitchen reset, editing TikToks, and scrolling at night took me from 30% to 20% super quickly, then down to 10%, 9%, and finally 2%. My conclusion: the battery is definitely improved, but for heavy iPhone users (like content creators, travel days, or doom scrolling), I don’t think it’s “safe” to rely on it for 12+ hours without a backup. That’s why I recommend having a slim power bank in your bag—especially one that doubles as a stand like my Baseus Pico MagSafe.