M2 MacBook Air 13" Battery Life

[R740]

Hi all, I've recently bought brand new 13" M2 MBA, replacing my old 2017 13" MBP with Touch Bar. I was hoping for a massive increase in battery life, considering both M2's efficiency and the fact that it's a new battery, but so far it's been disappointing. I'm getting around 6 hours of Safari browsing (some of it is watching Netflix/Twitch). Is this the actual battery life of 13" M2 MBA or should I have it checked at an authorised service provider as its under warranty?

Please see the battery level/usage graph screenshots attached.

Thank you in advance!

 

[h.gilbert]

screen brightness is a big factor

 

[Chairman.Jobbie]

Hi all, I've recently bought brand new 13" M2 MBA, replacing my old 2017 13" MBP with Touch Bar. I was hoping for a massive increase in battery life, considering both M2's efficiency and the fact that it's a new battery, but so far it's been disappointing. I'm getting around 6 hours of Safari browsing (some of it is watching Netflix/Twitch). Is this the actual battery life of 13" M2 MBA or should I have it checked at an authorised service provider as its under warranty?

Please see the battery level/usage graph screenshots attached.

Thank you in advance!

You can get support from apple remotely. But 6h for what you said you are doing seems low. If you brought it recently maybe it’s indexing? Idk. There might be something running in the background that is draining. Install iStatsmenu app and monitor whats going on.

 

[JiggyJaggy]

I have to admit, I also am finding my M1 battery is / was better than my M2. Tempted to go back to my M1 tbh.

 

[throAU]

I'd suggest that's worse than I'd expect.

I regularly get 10+ hours on my M1 Pro 14" (yeah its not an M2 air, but its got a beefier processor in it with an HDR display) whilst running a crapload of other applications at the same time.

Is this brand new out of the box? It may be restoring data/optimising/installing apps/whatever in the background.

 

[StoneJack]

Hi all, I've recently bought brand new 13" M2 MBA, replacing my old 2017 13" MBP with Touch Bar. I was hoping for a massive increase in battery life, considering both M2's efficiency and the fact that it's a new battery, but so far it's been disappointing. I'm getting around 6 hours of Safari browsing (some of it is watching Netflix/Twitch). Is this the actual battery life of 13" M2 MBA or should I have it checked at an authorised service provider as its under warranty?

Please see the battery level/usage graph screenshots attached.

Thank you in advance!

Erase and reinstall

 

[chrono1081]

That's not normal at all. I don't even know the battery life on my air because it never dies throughout the day and I use it probably 12+ hours most days.

 

[TSE]

I get 6-7 hours when I run a 3D game in Parallels under Windows 11. 8-9 when using native MacOS design applications for my career alongside some web browsing. 11-12 just web browsing, watching youtube, and listening to music.

Screen brightness I noticed is a huge factor. I could easily take a third of my battery life away from those numbers if I'm maxing out my screen brightness.

 

[6749974]

Erase and reinstall

I agree with this: Erase and reinstall and then test for a few days.

If that doesn't work, and you have the time before your return period ends, then use Apple Configurator from a second Mac to reset the firmware. I've heard of people (namely Marco Arment from Accidental Tech Podcast) having "invisible" hardware issues whereby using Apple Configurator fixed it.

Anecdotally, I get 10-hours of mixed usage with Safari (tons of tabs, including some YouTube) and other productivity apps; brightness setting is 100%.

I will caution that you should first read Activity Monitor and see what is using your CPU, to make sure it isn't a rogue app or background process. I'm in the habit of daily restarts because I've had apps bug out and use too much CPU and/or memory. Long battery life requires apps be mostly idle (as in, not use CPU other than for a split second, called 'burst processing'), so it only takes one app using the CPU for extended timeframes to ruin your battery-life-expectations. When you find an app doing that, delete and use a more optimized alternative (eg. Chrome using too much resource? Start using Safari).

Note that some people will naturally have workflows that use the CPU all the time and then wonder why their battery life isn't 16 hours—know that you won't get anything near that if you're using apps and workflows that often require CPU processing. You will only get 10-13 hours of battery life from using apps that are mostly reading (eg. Safari browsing) or streaming H.265 video, because the CPU is idle while you're reading or watching/listening to optimized media. Also, 16 hours isn't realistic for mixed use so lower expectations because Apple marketing numbers are creating false hope.

EDIT: If you haven't already, go to System Settings → Battery, then put Low Power Mode on "Only on Battery." What this does is prioritize most thread requests to use the efficiency cores, thus extending battery life. You shouldn't notice a speed difference for the most part so it's a great setting to turn on.

 

[Honza1]

There are many threads like this, if you search for them here, you will find very good suggestions and explanations. No, this is not normal. But, it happens routinely, same as for any other hardware and OS. Typically it would be displya setting to higher than middle. They do all testing at mid setting as display is very large consumer of power overall.
It can be something else, which is using needlessly power, to identify what it is open Activity Monitor application (in Applications/Utilities) and check tab "Energy". You will see listing of applications, with their current energy impact and 12 hours value. YOu can see what is using your energy and may be it is not needed and can be closed. There are some well known applications which are energy hogs. On my system *(last 12 hours) it is News. I run that for relatively short time yesterday evening, yet it is the higher energy user. Second is Safari, but that I actually do need. Next is Mail, which I can close if not used and save some power. Typical problematic apps for me are Teams and Chrome.
The hardware and OS with display setting at 50% will run for estimated time. It is our applications, which can shorten this.

 

[JiggyJaggy]

I have factory reset my M2 and have exactly the same apps and use the M2 in exactly the same way as my M1 and I can't help feel the battery doesn't last as long as my M1. Anyone else finding this?

I even went as far as replacing my M2 for a like for like and still find the battery on my M1 was better. How is every one else finding the battery differences between M! and M2?

 

[Zest28]

M2 runs hotter and uses more power than M1. Not a surprise.

 

[Flav]

Install Coconut Battery and check Discharging rate. That will show you if it is a defective battery or a background process. I am writing this from a MacBook Air M1 and it uses about 3 watts at the moment.

coconutBattery 4 - by coconut-flavour.com

With coconutBattery you are always aware of your current battery health. It shows you live information about the battery in your Mac and iOS devices (iPhone, iPad)

www.coconut-flavour.com

 

[halledise]

i currently only have safari and mail open and it's showing 8 watts discharge rate.
my former M1 MBPro wasn't as hungry on battery power

 

[JustAnExpat]

Here's the questions I'd ask:

1. What programs are you running? If you're running Safari/ Chrome, what type of web pages? Do these webpages use a lot of CPU work (use Activity Monitor to find out).
2. Are there background processes running? Is Spotlight indexing?
3. What's the battery capacity? (use Coconut Battery, search Google, to find out what the capacity is). If the capacity is low, return the machine.

 

[AppleFanatic10]

This is unfortunate. I wonder what the update is. I just bought a m2 13' MBA and the battery life is great.