According to apples website it is a good idea to completely drain the battery at least once a month, and then do a full recharge, to help prolong the life of the battery.

I usually keep my battery topped up, and it is very rarely below 50% so I am thinking it would be a good idea to drain it overnight while I am sleeping, anyone got any ideas how best to accomplish this?

A movie or music with the sound turned off and turn it face down...then charge in the morning. That's what I do. Or just set the screen auto lock to never and turn the brightness all the way up.

The iPad is the only gadget that you have to go out of your way to discharge the battery

I normally charge mine over night and use it all day, and it goes down to around 60% or so. So I just don't charge it one night and it's down to zero the next day and I can charge it.

Ive never seen anything about it being good to drain the battery....it won't do anything...actually I could only see it being a bad thing to do, since LiON batterys have a limited number of charge discharge cycles that are equal to draining the battery completely.

If you really want to kill it tho you can turn the brightness up all the way and play NOVA for about 6 hours...that should do it.

Actually, Apple recommends draining the battery once per month.

Apple - Batteries - iPad

Use Your iPad Regularly

For proper reporting of the battery’s state of charge, be sure to go through at least one charge cycle per month (charging the battery to 100% and then completely running it down).

I'm actually hitting the 15-20% mark every other day...that's when I juice it while I sleep. I never understood those that constantly keep topping off their battery (at a desk, in a car, etc). Just use your device as you normally would and you will drain the battery to a point that will allow you to get into a charging cycle based on your usage.

Originally Posted by Matth3w

Apple - Batteries - iPad

Use Your iPad Regularly

For proper reporting of the battery’s state of charge, be sure to go through at least one charge cycle per month (charging the battery to 100% and then completely running it down).

I think gentlefury is correct, Li-Ion batteries lifespan is based on battery cycles, so the lower you let the battery get the more cycles you are running.

If you re read what apple says in your quote, you will notice that they state the reason for discharging the battery once a month is not for longer battery life but 'for proper rerporting of the battery's state of charge' or basically to calibrate the battery level indicator system.

I doubt they would have you discharge it once a month if it lowered battery life significantly, so I wouldn't worry about it, but at the same time I wouldn't intentionally do it more often than that.

I agree, and I am aware of what Li-Ion batteries do...that being said, I'm going to take Apple's word for it straight from a specific page about the iPad battery over any one person's view on a message board.

That's no offense to anyone present, of course.

So I discharge mine fully once per month.

I really don't pay much attention to all this for the simple reason that the useful battery life of these type of batteries is about 36 months, no matter how you use it. I will buy a new gen iPad in two years (or before) anyway....