Leaving Your Laptop Always Plugged In Will Kill Its Battery Faster

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Posted September 28, 2013 at 4:18pm by iClarified

Leaving your laptop always plugged in will kill its battery life faster, according to a recent report from Wired. In fact, you shouldn't even let it charge to 100%.

Cadex Electronics CEO Isidor Buchmann tells the site that ideally users would charge their laptops to 80% and then drain them to 40%, prolonging their battery life by up to 4x.

The reason is that each cell in a lithium-polymer battery is charged to a voltage level. The higher the charge percentage, the higher the voltage level. The more voltage a cell has to store, the more stress it’s put under. That stress leads to fewer discharge cycles. For example, Battery University states that a battery charged to 100 percent will have only 300-500 discharge cycles, while a battery charged to 70 percent will get 1,200-2,000 discharge cycles.

This is simple in theory but much harder in practice. The report suggests timing how long it takes your device to charge from 40% to 80% and then setting a timer when you first plug your laptop in to charge.

If you can remember to follow Buchmann's advice, a four times increase in battery life is a significant improvement.

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Leaving Your Laptop Always Plugged In Will Kill Its Battery Faster

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abd - October 2, 2013 at 7:16am

what a funny and misleading information. if the battery life time is 400 to 500 charging cycle, and let the battery last for 10hours, that mean the battery will work 4000 to 5000 hours, if discharged fully and then charged fully. with the information in this study, if we charge upto 70% and discharge upto 40% as suggested, the battery will have 1200 to 2000 cycles. so for 3hours of usages times, then the battery will have 3600 to 6000 working hours. what is the difference. very funny study

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Met - September 29, 2013 at 6:19pm

in related news, water is confirmed wet.

Manish Gupta - September 29, 2013 at 3:53pm

Call your service provider, they will unlock it for you for free if you aren't in the contract, you don't need to jailbreak or use some other third party service for remote unlock, if you are in contract then find a friend whose contract is complete and switch your IMEI of your iphone with a different phone's IMEI on your account then update your iphone IMEI to your friend's account and call the customer service to get it unlock since the contract is up for your friends phone and they will unlock it for you, once the unlock is dont put the SIM card back into your iphone,. your will be unlocked for free from your own service provider, if you have any questions then let me know, thanks..

Nidin Vinayakan - September 29, 2013 at 11:14am

Remove battery when it charged 100% to avoid damage from excess heat and you can plug it back when you are going out with laptop. Problem solved :)

liuping - September 29, 2013 at 11:21am

unfortunately, Storing a Lithium Ion battery at 100% charge for long periods reduces battery life as well. If not being used, they should be stored at 50% charge.

Ss - September 29, 2013 at 10:56am

Apple already said it has a battery controller that, when battery reaches 100%, it stops charging the batteries and let it go down a little bit then recharges it again. All that to keep the chemicals active abd avoid that crap you posted

Ken - September 29, 2013 at 7:33am

Might be true; I had my 2008 MacBook plugged in most of the time for around 4 years and the result? The battery bulged.

Me - September 28, 2013 at 11:55pm

I agree ! I let my Macbook Pro all the way to 3% or even 2% then I plug it in. Been doing that since I bought it It holds the battery charge almost for 4 Hrs.

aasd - September 28, 2013 at 11:18pm

laptops throttle performance when draining battery so its a trade off a generally you wait for something to process therefore losing productivity

macbook pro - September 28, 2013 at 5:08pm

this is not completely true, more cycles in your battery will mean less charge and that will drain your battery faster you should recalibrate your battery about once a month but otherwise leave it plugged in when you can that works for me

LM - September 28, 2013 at 5:05pm

Just charge your battery and unplug it. Profit

Aieh - September 28, 2013 at 5:03pm

This is stupid! From 70% to 40% - 3h - 2000.3=6000h From 100% to 10% - 12h - 500.12= 6000h It's the same thing!

liuping - September 29, 2013 at 11:28am

I believe they mean equivalent full charge cycles. Smaller charges do less damage to the batteries and they last longer. This makes sense and is the same thing EV car owners have to deal with.

Sfc - September 28, 2013 at 5:03pm

My 3 years old MacBook Pro is on charge cycle 513, health ranges 75% to 80% since about 50 charge cycles. Check battery message popped up since about 200 charge cycles. Lucky to get more than 3 hrs running on battery, doing simple tasks. Whereas my friends' can do around 6hrs with their battery charging habits.

Sfc - September 28, 2013 at 4:59pm

I always treated my MacBook Pro battery with care (discharge regularly and avoid leaving laptop charging at 100% for too long). Had 3 batteries failed prematurely with poor battery health and check battery messages. Whereas 2 of my friends who constantly leaves their MacBook Pros on charge almost permanently, their battery health is no less than 97% after 3 years of use (less than 30 charge cycles). I can use their laptops on battery and lasted much longer than mine (same model and purchased at the same time)

Peter John - September 28, 2013 at 4:38pm

How about in the case of iphone or ipad? :)

DarkKn1ght - September 28, 2013 at 4:35pm

That's what I'm saying .

kevinmaccloud - September 28, 2013 at 4:29pm

Thank you clarified! You guys are freaking Sherlocks

Andy9 - September 28, 2013 at 4:21pm

This has been a fact for so long .... Every month let at least once let the battery dried to 0% and dead and fully charge it up to recycle the battery cycle ... That's what i do and mac air 11 late 2011 still goes 4 hrs