Are you properly maintaining the laptop battery? While battery life and chip efficiency are improving, avoiding a few missteps will help maintain the long-term health of your laptop battery.
Continuously Charging It
The myth of overcharging is the source of the belief that leaving your laptop plugged in all the time is “bad,” although laptops and other devices that utilize these batteries switch to a trickle charge as they approach capacity. If you leave your laptop plugged in all the time, it won’t blow up or “overcharge.”
In light of this, your laptop’s lithium-ion battery will live longer if it does not maintain a high voltage level for an extended length of time. If we’re talking about battery health, you may extend the life of your battery by not always keeping it charged to 100 percent. This entails utilizing your battery throughout the day by disconnecting it as opposed to leaving it connected in.
Consider your laptop as a large smartphone to make things easier. The battery technology in your phone is the same as that in your laptop, yet most people find it crazy to always have their phone hooked into the power.
No matter what you do, your laptop battery will eventually deteriorate, just like your smartphone. However, for the vast majority of individuals, it is difficult to be a model citizen when it comes to good battery habits.
You may try to extend it by adhering to good standards the majority of the time. Your battery’s capacity will probably have decreased to around 70% of its initial capacity after about three years, at which time, if you’re not intending on upgrading, you can choose to replace it for a little price.
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letting it get too hot or cold
Extreme temperatures are the single worst killer of batteries. It is well known that lithium-ion batteries do not perform well in extremely hot or cold temperatures. It is possible for the cell to suffer irreparable harm if your laptop is left in a car that has been exposed to temperatures below zero (below 0c or 32f).
In order to reduce damage in very cold weather and improve performance on chilly mornings, several electric vehicles (EVs) that use lithium-ion batteries have temperature control systems in their vehicles.
Such systems are not present on your laptop, thus you need take extra precautions. It’s a good idea to wait for the battery to warm up before attempting to use your laptop if the worst happens and it is exposed to the cold.
You may encounter this issue at any time of year as heat is another factor that can harm your laptop battery. Both leaving your laptop in the sun for extended periods of time and allowing it to become so heated that the safety features activate and the power is cut off are bad ideas.
You may avoid this by not using your laptop at full capacity in a stuffy area without enough ventilation. When using a laptop on a bed or other fabric surface, exercise additional caution because many of them include vents at the sides and back of the lid that can easily be obstructed by soft furniture.
Consider how bad things may go if you tax your laptop with 3D apps or a video render if you notice that it gets unusually warm while in regular usage. Consider cleaning it out to enhance airflow (particularly if it’s a few years old) since dust and other debris can amass in the vents and within the laptop.
Remember that certain laptop companies’ warranties will be voided if they are opened. It could be a good idea to get in touch with the manufacturer if you’re observing heat buildup and your equipment is still covered by warranty to have the issue looked at. They can at least blast away the dust without jeopardizing your guarantee for further repairs. Absence of Shallow Discharges.
When lithium-ion batteries are used at between 40 and 80 percent of their maximum capacity, they last longer. The battery’s lifespan may be shortened if it is discharged too much or is kept above 80% for an extended length of time. As summarized by Battery University, several manufacturers now include battery-preserving “long-life” options to help with this:
To extend the battery life of some laptops, you may set a charge percentage cap of about 80%. The “Battery Limit Mode” setting for Microsoft Surface devices and MyASUS for ASUS customers are two examples of manufacturer-specific programmes that provide this capability.
The Battery Limiter programme for Windows is free to test out by other users. If you maintain a regular schedule, you may utilize Apple’s built-in optimized charging capability or AlDente to establish a charge limit on macOS.
By keeping your laptop at a lower capacity until you need it, Optimized Charging adapts to your schedule. Even if you put your laptop in the night before, macOS won’t conduct the full 100 percent charge until the morning if it knows that you take it off charge to leave for work every day at 8 a.m.
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Avoiding monthly discharge
Given that we’ve just said it’s undesirable to let a battery completely deplete, this may seem paradoxical. However, if a battery is never given a chance to completely drain, it may start displaying its current charge level incorrectly. For a number of reasons, this is awful.
To begin with, you could not be aware of how much battery you still have and might run out. Knowing your actual charge level is essential for adhering to many other smart habits, such as maintaining your battery above 40% or limiting charging to about 80%.
This is especially true if you’re using an app like AlDente or Battery Limiter to fully commit to keeping your battery charge at or below 100 percent. We advise fully draining once a month because this type of usage can necessitate more frequent recalibrations of your battery levels.
Take care of the battery in your smartphone
Much of this advice also applies to your smartphone, which is a portable laptop fueled by a tiny lithium-ion cell. On iOS, there are features like Optimized Charging, which is also referred to as Adaptive Charging on Android.
Your battery will eventually need to be replaced. Find out how to recognize when it’s time to replace the old cell. Once your battery is in tip-top form, purchase a reliable portable charger to ensure that you never let it drop too low (more than once a month).
