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julesme

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 14, 2016
625
2,222
San Jose
My M1 Max MBP no longer uses optimized battery charging, even though I have it turned on. In other words, it always charges to 100%, which is not ideal. Is there a way to reset or change a setting somewhere in Monterey so that optimized charging works again, as it did when I first bought the laptop?

Also - has anyone else encountered this issue? It's been several months since it optimized. It used to be a such a great feature on this laptop!
 
Last edited:

Mike Boreham

macrumors 68040
Aug 10, 2006
3,904
1,894
UK
My M1 Max MBP no longer uses optimized battery charging, even though I have it turned on. In other words, it always charges to 100%, which is not ideal. Is there a way to reset or change a setting somewhere so that optimized charging works again, as it did when I first bought the laptop?

Also - has anyone else encountered this issue? It's been several months since it optimized. It used to be a such a great feature on this laptop!
I don't know of a way to re-set it. My MBA, has never done and I have installed AlDente Pro, which does the same thing with much more control. Discussed in many threads here.
 

julesme

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Oct 14, 2016
625
2,222
San Jose
I don't know of a way to re-set it. My MBA, has never done and I have installed AlDente Pro, which does the same thing with much more control. Discussed in many threads here.

Thanks - I just installed AlDente, and I've got it set to 80%. It seems to be working so far.

I still wonder why there isn't an easy way to tell Monterey to start its battery charging algorithm over again. It worked really well for a few months, giving me the option to either let the battery sit at 80% or "charge to full now." Sadly, that option has disappeared. I assume it's a bug, but why hasn't Apple addressed it?

Apple could also add an option in MacOS that says "Recalibrate battery optimization." The text under this option would say, "If your schedule has changed, or if your battery is not charging to full at the right time, check this box and MacOS will analyze your recent charging behavior to determine the best time to charge to full."

My usable battery capacity is down to 97% after 10.5 months. That doesn't seem too bad at all, but I assume it would be higher if 1) I'd had Aldente installed or 2) Apple's battery optimization worked correctly instead of constantly charging to 100% and then maintaining a 100% charge.
 
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okkibs

macrumors 65816
Sep 17, 2022
1,069
1,004
If you use the battery more often it will disable the 80% wait and charge it fully every time. Once you use it more rarely on battery again it will halt at 80% after at least 2-3 weeks. It really needs a while to get the hint. From my experience it resets every time you fully shut down, making the feature pretty worthless unless you only ever send the thing to sleep. So if you are doing that, you are resetting it so often that it will never activate.
 

Mike Boreham

macrumors 68040
Aug 10, 2006
3,904
1,894
UK
Thanks - I just installed AlDente, and I've got it set to 80%. It seems to be working so far.

I still wonder why there isn't an easy way to tell Monterey to start its battery charging algorithm over again. It worked really well for a few months, giving me the option to either let the battery sit at 80% or "charge to full now." Sadly, that option has disappeared. I assume it's a bug, but why hasn't Apple addressed it?

Apple could also add an option in MacOS that says "Recalibrate battery optimization." The text under this option would say, "If your schedule has changed, or if your battery is not charging to full at the right time, check this box and MacOS will analyze your recent charging behavior to determine the best time to charge to full."

My usable battery capacity is down to 97% after 10.5 months. That doesn't seem too bad at all, but I assume it would be higher if 1) I'd had Aldente installed or 2) Apple's battery optimization worked correctly instead of constantly charging to 100% and then maintaining a 100% charge.

I agree it is a mystery why it works for some and not others. In its early days people for whom it worked said it took a few weeks to start working. I left my M1 MBA trying for three months without success, then AlDente was released for Silicon Macs in Feb 2021 and it has been on it ever since. I use 50% because I believe it is the optimum % for storing Li-ion.

My M1 MBA was new in November 2020 so it is now 23 months and has 93 cycles. Apple Battery Max Capacity value in System Report is 100%. The <ioreg> value used by Coconut and third party apps is 98% but this fluctuates and has been lower at times.
 
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TriciaMacMillan

macrumors 6502
Nov 10, 2021
251
149
If you use the battery more often it will disable the 80% wait and charge it fully every time. Once you use it more rarely on battery again it will halt at 80% after at least 2-3 weeks. It really needs a while to get the hint. From my experience it resets every time you fully shut down, making the feature pretty worthless unless you only ever send the thing to sleep. So if you are doing that, you are resetting it so often that it will never activate.

Mac MacBook Pro M1 is plugged in most of the time, but I‘m pretty sure I’ve never seen it to charge to anything near to 80%. Checking out AlDente now as well.
 
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