Sorry to hijack the thread but what is the best way to putting the Air on the charger. I just leave mine off and never top it off and will charge it when it gets below 10%, is this the best way to do it?
I think it kind of depends. My Macs both have smart battery charging on, but they learn different behaviors for that feature based on how I use them. My work MacBook Pro is almost never undocked and detached from my desk, so it registers in battery settings as "Rarely Used On Battery". I'm on it right now, and it was plugged in all night, but is only at 79%. I know that seems a bit wonky, but here's why it does that: my company forces Power Nap on via JAMF. So at night, my work Mac wakes up a lot to do things on the network and check for updates and stuff. My work computer has learned that it needs to optimize the battery at night too because that feature eats a lot of battery. Because it usually keeps the charge level between 75-80%, there is no risk of the battery swelling or degrading prematurely, even though I literally almost never unplug the machine.
On my personal M1 MacBook Air, the charger always fully charges it up to 100%, because the Mac has learned that it never stays at 100% long. I definitely get the advertised 15 hours per charge on my MBA, so it rarely gets plugged in. When it does get plugged in, it's overnight, and then I'm back in action the next day.
I think smart battery charging started out a little rocky, but it's solid now in my opinion. My advice is use the computer however it's most convenient for you and let the AI worry about the battery health/charge. You can always tell it "Charge To Full Now" in the menu if you need to plan ahead and work somewhere away from an outlet.
