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MacBook Air M1 battery life
- Thread starter robook
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I'd say it is lower than expected. Damn, always the same with MacBook batteries... I already had problems with my 2010 MacBook Pro battery, and a premature degradation. Why the hell do this happen?
Luckily, this MacBooks last much longer so having less battery is not such a big deal as it was with Intel machines.
I have to say that in the settings I see that the battery is at 100% of design capacity.
The problem with BigSur is that About this Mac -> System Info doesn't show how many mAh do you have remaining. It just say 100% and that's it. I'd say Coconutbatery is more accurate, but if you go to an Apple Store, they will just say your battery is at 100%.
I experienced this when my previous MacBook battery was degrading quickly, and I complained, and their % was different, than what actually was, showing on their diagnostics less degradation than what actually was happening. A battery has to be in really bad shape (75%) to show them it is at 80% -this is just an example, not actual numbers-, which was the % they used to guarantee during the first year (two years in Europe). They used to guarantee the 80% during a year or 1.000 cycles.
I experienced this when my previous MacBook battery was degrading quickly, and I complained, and their % was different, than what actually was, showing on their diagnostics less degradation than what actually was happening. A battery has to be in really bad shape (75%) to show them it is at 80% -this is just an example, not actual numbers-, which was the % they used to guarantee during the first year (two years in Europe). They used to guarantee the 80% during a year or 1.000 cycles.
From Apple's perspective, yes. I'm sorry, you can always exchange it for a new one before the christmas sales time ends, but if you mention this issue, they will tell you your battery is normal. That's all I can say, 96% is not bad for a computer with months of usage, but I don't see it normal for a machine with 13 days. Let's wait and see what others tell you.
Does someone actually have MBA M1 with battery health 100% or even over when using Coconutbattery or similar too to dig up real data?
My new MBA has been around 99% right out of the box and based on some other thread this was discussed others reporting their readings were about the same. Not sure why battery is so weak already??
My previous MBP 2019 13" was still well OVER 100% health even after over 1 year of use (well above design capacity!!).
My new MBA has been around 99% right out of the box and based on some other thread this was discussed others reporting their readings were about the same. Not sure why battery is so weak already??
My previous MBP 2019 13" was still well OVER 100% health even after over 1 year of use (well above design capacity!!).
I keep it only because it's good the battery life even with this ''Capacity design''
Just received my MBA M1 today and getting (with battery cycles=1) 98.6% capacity on Coconut Battery (4.322 mAh Current Charge = Full Charge Capacity vs. 4.382 mAh Design Capacity).
I think it is more a Coconut software problem/glitch rather than a real battery problem (or at least I hope so....)
the battery needs a couple of cycles and some topping up to 100% (calibrating) in order to reach its full potential
I really doubt that. Not all batteries come with 100%. Especially with MBAs. Apple‘s QC isn’t what it once was. This is the new normal. iPhones still come with decent quality batteries. Macs and iPads don‘t.
Maybe you're right, I tried to check the battery of my iPad with coconut and with another program. Coconut showed less battery remaining capacity than this other program (I don't remember the name).
I know that it is not a good practice to fully discharge phones or laptop batteries but I think 2 or 3 cycles might be needed to get the right calibration
batteries get worse over time anyway
you just can try to slow that degradation down somewhat
a new battery needs some breaking in
after that keeping it at around 30 - 80% is best, no extensive heat
one cycle does not necessarily equal from 0 to 100%
a cycle may be from 50 to 70 5 times, which is what you would want to do
with some topping up in-between to calibrate it
after that avoid hitting below 20 or staying at 100% for a prolonged period of time, avoid extensive heat, too
I have actually done this with my iPhone XS Max and after more than two years the battery is still 100% max charge, though admittedly it is more difficult to do with a laptop
true, I have same difficulty here with my laptop
wish apple would implement an option to charge the battery to a given maximum (60, 70 or 80%)
some low spec windows laptops do offer that
By the way, if I have my macbook air plugged to the power and only once in a while unplug it, the setting for optimizing battery health wont work right? Because it is not something predictable
I used to use my MacBook plugged in almost all of the time
result: few cycles but lots of constant stress on the battery (health degraded rapidly)
would not want to do that any more
AFAIK apple did some optimisations first in iOS then in macOS to reduce that kind of stress on the battery, but I would like to be able to choose the max charge percentage (would set it to no more than 80% unless more is needed)
I don' think so. Coconutbattery just pulls this information from the system without "sugarcoating" it. I mean if anyone paid any attention about battery data in MacOS is that in Big Sur it has been changed to even more limited regarding actual battery health data...
I've been laughing at this system info percentage too, and the fact they do not show mAh there anymore. That is sugarcoating if you ask me.
BTW! If you mean by calibration routine that suggest draining battery empty and them charge full few times, just don't. These modern day li-ion batteries don't like to be drain fully and you likely do just more harm than good since deep discharge is very harmful for this type of battery. I never done such for my MBP and battery health was still aroung 102% after over one year of use!!!
Thanks for the info - it was recommended for the Apple batteries, but the date on the sources were a few years ago. I'll not do it and see if it continues.