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94% battery design capacity in a little more than a month of use (Macbook Pro 16")

J

juril

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 14, 2020
7
2
As title says, I'm experiencing a really terrible battery problem in my Macbook Pro. I received my device of the 5th of June with 98% design capacity. This capacity fluctuated between ~97% to ~99% in the first week of use.


Fast forward a month and 5 days later, my laptop's design capacity has drastically gone down to 94.1%. I got worried the moment it hit 95%, but shrugged it off because of the stuff I read online (basically that this is normal and you shouldn't be worried yada yada). But as seen here in my battery history it has been gradually going down with no signs of stopping.

I'm not really sure what's the point of this post, but I guess I just wanna ask if some of you guys have experienced this on your devices as well, and if so, what did you do to remedy it or at least keep it at that level.

For what it's worth, I have never done video editing and gaming on my device. The only application that constantly uses my dGPU is Figma, since I need it for work. Peak temperature that I've seen was only around 60+ °C, which I don't think is that worrisome at all.
 
And read this thread...

forums.macrumors.com

What should I limit my battery charge level to?

So I want to limit my battery charge on my MacBook Pro. Anyway, what should I limit it to? 80%? 70%? Or 50 or 40%? Apple suggests to store their battery at 50%, so maybe at that? I'm going to be running off of AC power, by the way. Thanks! ___ DISCLAIMER: Before some smartass decides to tell...
forums.macrumors.com forums.macrumors.com
 
iRun26.2 said:
And read this thread...

forums.macrumors.com

What should I limit my battery charge level to?

So I want to limit my battery charge on my MacBook Pro. Anyway, what should I limit it to? 80%? 70%? Or 50 or 40%? Apple suggests to store their battery at 50%, so maybe at that? I'm going to be running off of AC power, by the way. Thanks! ___ DISCLAIMER: Before some smartass decides to tell...
forums.macrumors.com forums.macrumors.com
Click to expand...

Thank you for this thread! But I'm not too sure if this can still help me, though. I think Charge Limiter/Al Dente only works well if your battery design capacity is still fine (unlike mine). But I guess I will have to wait and see as I'm using Al Dente at 60% max right now.
 
juril said:
Thank you for this thread! But I'm not too sure if this can still help me, though. I think Charge Limiter/Al Dente only works well if your battery design capacity is still fine (unlike mine). But I guess I will have to wait and see as I'm using Al Dente at 60% max right now.
Click to expand...
Read through the whole thread and you’ll see how the techniques can actually dramatically improve your battery’s health.
 
Same as you op! Got mine last december. It was never 100% out of the box. It hovered around 95% most of the time I’ve owned it. The past couple of days it dropped to 92.8% so I thought hmm lemme reset the SMC and calibrate the battery again.. and that made it worse; it’s 91% now.. 71 CYLCES. Battery manufacturer is SIMPLO. And I’m just infuriated by this tbh.. 9% capacity loss in 7 months and light use + 71 cycles only?? WTF APPLE??
 
CheesePuff said:
How many battery cycles are on it?
Click to expand...
22, although I don't think it matters that much in this scenario.
[automerge]1594394631[/automerge]
khalitzy said:
Same as you op! Got mine last december. It was never 100% out of the box. It hovered around 95% most of the time I’ve owned it. The past couple of days it dropped to 92.8% so I thought hmm lemme reset the SMC and calibrate the battery again.. and that made it worse; it’s 91% now.. 71 CYLCES. Battery manufacturer is SIMPLO. And I’m just infuriated by this tbh.. 9% capacity loss in 7 months and light use + 71 cycles only?? WTF APPLE??
Click to expand...
9% in 7 months? Not gonna lie, I'd be happy.. mine dropped 6 in 1 month!
 
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Sending Data to compare. I only have 10 cycles and batter is made by DSY, but yeah I would probably be the same level of concerned as you.

I try to keep mine MOSTLY plugged in, and owned it for about a month+, but it looks like it just came with a high battery?

Screen Shot 2020-07-10 at 12.03.35 PM.png
 
You have warranty for at least one year. On these devices, Apple Care is good idea and then you have 3 years warranty.
Keep track of it, but capacity varies wildly. Once a week coconutBattery record is great idea. I had my battery replaced (in my 2017 MBP) due to keyboard replacement. During the last three months battery capacity oscillated between 100% and 95% with average around 98% or so (cycle numbers 48 - 75). There was once a drop from 100.5% to 94.5% during 14 days. And then it recovered back up...
These numbers are highly approximate and vary based on recent use, discharge level etc. Basically, they are wild guesses the system makes. Do not put much trust in any one (or short time) absolute value (every battery may be calibrated slightly differently) and in few % oscillations (depends on charge/discharge/temperature history). Look at long term trends over many cycles/months.
If it keeps falling, at some point (80%) Apple will replace it. If it is osciallting as mine, it is normal. Every my battery has done that, some in smaller and some in larger range. Nothing to worry about, if it does not keep dropping.
 
Try disabling battery health and see what happens. My month old 13”MBP went from 101% to 96% in a couple of weeks. When I turned off battery health it was back to 101% the next day. Apple is reducing the max charge level of the battery (battery health enabled) which effectively appears to be a reduction in capacity to the battery monitoring apps. I have battery health enabled again and my battery max capacity is back down to 97%.
 
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It is possible that the Battery Health Management fakes the maximum capacity to a lower level which then reports a lower capacity to CoconutBattery or others, because that much of a drop and with only 21 cycles in that period is not normal. However if it is true, then if you hit 80% within the year of purchase you will get it replaced for free.
 
Battery Health Management is sort of like taking pre-med courses.... you swear you have all sorts of maladies after reading about them ;)

Of all the portable computers I've purchased since an AST PremiumExec 386SX/25 in the dark ages of computing my focus has been more about battery hygiene than health which has served me well.

Only had two (of ~15 total Macbook's purchased since ~2001) that ended up with battery issues after 5+ years of use (one failed to charge anymore and the other bulged big time).
 
Biscotti said:
Sending Data to compare. I only have 10 cycles and batter is made by DSY, but yeah I would probably be the same level of concerned as you.

I try to keep mine MOSTLY plugged in, and owned it for about a month+, but it looks like it just came with a high battery?

View attachment 932585
Click to expand...

Interesting. FWIW, mine is also DSY.

How's the usual load when you're using your laptop? Do you use it heavily (i.e. dGPU is running) or just simple, everyday tasks like browsing web, etc?
 
duffyanneal said:
Try disabling battery health and see what happens. My month old 13”MBP went from 101% to 96% in a couple of weeks. When I turned off battery health it was back to 101% the next day. Apple is reducing the max charge level of the battery (battery health enabled) which effectively appears to be a reduction in capacity to the battery monitoring apps. I have battery health enabled again and my battery max capacity is back down to 97%.
Click to expand...

Will try turning it off and see what happens.
 
It is the battery health management feature. I had the same on my new 2020 13" MBP. It even dropped to 94%.

When I switched off battery health management, it went to 100 again%.

So now I have put battery health management on again knowing that it is working like intended and I will be fine with 94% battery health.
 
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