Anyone else experiencing battery drain issues after every update?

Yes. My Fenix 7 Pro went down 15% overnight. 

I’ve also noticed that the background activity logged on my iPhone is up in the 10+ hours. So perhaps it is constantly trying to sync to GC.

Yep, just looked at my battery iPhone stats. GC and Connect IQ were active constantly during the night.  

In the last 24hrs, GC has had 11h20m background activity, Connect IQ has 9hr16m

Yes, very similar experience except drain wont stop with reset..

one suggestion would be to reboot your phone.

For the first time here the same problem … 2% per hour … before 0,09%

reboot of watch and phone didn’t help 

how to downgrade to the last version, anyone knows?

For me deinstalling the app „Sun & Moon times“ from gasteropod solved the problem - from 2%per hour to 0,19% per hour immediately!

For avoiding battery drain issues caused by a firmware update, I recommend the following:

1. Disable automated updates in the settings
2. Watch the forum for new firmware announcements (typically at the end of each quartal)
3. When new firmware is available and fully rolled out, connect your watch over the USB cable to a computer and check for updates with Garmin Express 
4. Let the watch charge to 100% and wait a few minutes more before disconnecting the cable
5. Disconnect and let the watch do the firmware update
6. Reconnect and check for updates with GE again, to see whether the new firmware does not need to download some additional elements
7. Disconnect and do the soft-reset (hold the Light button for ~30s till it shuts down, then restart)
8. Use the watch several days or weeks till a very low battery level, then fully recharge - that will re-calibrate the battery gauge in case the calibration was misaligned during the update

The rational behind it is that the OTA updates are problematic, slow, and I suspect that they can even lead to a bricked watch, for example when loading an additional Sensor Hub firmware fails (we see it reported here on the forum each quartal). The download speed for the OTA update is throttled seriously, and it may take several hours or days to download the firmware. And when some additional components (SNS, GPS, languages, maps, zone tables,...) need to be installed, after the main firmware is in place, it may indeed lead to a prolonged downloading attempts in the next few days.

Besides that the watch may malfunction, if all components are not updated to the latest matching versions. The installation of additional components may also fail if there is insufficient storage (especially a problem at watches with small memory, such as Instinct).

The next problem is, when the OTA update happens unattended in the night with a depleted battery. In the worst case it can theoretically lead to a bricked watch, if the battery dies in the middle of the upgrade. Depleted or a half charged battery may also lead to a decalibration of the battery gauge, which then reports wrong levels, and rapid discharging rates despite that the reality is often (though not always) all right.

Following the steps described above, will prevent all of this. I do always my updates in this way, and I do also install all available beta versions since many years on several Garmin models (hence having already done certainly over a hundred of firmware updates), and I never experienced any battery drain problems after an update.

"Use the watch several days or weeks till a very low battery level, then fully recharge - that will re-calibrate the battery gauge"

I've bought an instinct 2x about a month ago, and the battery indicates an average 4-5% consumption per day in smart watch mode (the pulse ox-off) 

I want to calibrate the battery by draining the battery till the watch is powered off. To have a 40 day battery life it must consume max 2,5 % per day.

It is ok to drain the battery till the watch is powered off?

Vlad said:

To have a 40 day battery life it must consume max 2,5 % per day

You will get up to 40 days only in the plain smartwatch mode with no activities, no pulseox, no IQ watchfaces or widgets, no excessive use of syncing, backlight, flashlight, etc.

Vlad said:

It is ok to drain the battery till the watch is powered off?

If it happens occasionally, and you do not keep the watch discharged for many weeks, then it is safe.

I've been following all of these steps since v12 or 13, but haven't helped