My iPhone 14 is about 2 years old now and I've noticed the battery health dropped to 82%. I'm wondering if this is normal wear and tear or if I should be doing something different with how I charge it. Does everyone's iPhone battery degrade this quickly?
Apple designed iPhones to retain 80% of their original battery capacity after 500 full charge cycles, and you're right at that threshold after two years. Your 82% health is actually pretty normal wear and tear - most people hit somewhere in the 80-85% range around the two-year mark if they charge regularly. The degradation slows down after that initial drop, so you're not going to see it plummet to 50% anytime soon.
That said, a few habits do make a real difference. Keeping your phone cooler helps a lot - don't leave it in the sun or in a hot car, and avoid using it heavily while it's charging. Wireless chargers tend to generate more heat than wired ones, so if you're doing that constantly, switching back to a cable might buy you a bit of battery longevity. Also, letting it regularly drain all the way to zero isn't great either, though occasional deep discharges won't kill your battery overnight.
Whether you should do anything about it really depends on your usage. If you're still getting through a full day without charging, your 82% is fine and you can just keep doing what you're doing. But if you're noticing the phone dying earlier in the day or you plan to keep this phone for another couple of years, you might want to swap the battery - it's way cheaper than buying a new phone, and the degradation will reset.
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