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Le0M

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 13, 2020
955
1,293
Hello everyone,

I decided to open this thread because I'm having battery issues myself with my new M1 MacBook Pro, and since I still cannot understand If the battery has some issues or it's just paranoia, I came to this conclusion:
It would be good if people shared their battery life while using the mac for a couple of hours doing this or that, with related display brightness and see how much the battery drains for that amount of time.
Having lots of these real life tests would make it easier to understand if some people are affected by real battery issues.
To make it easier and "universal", let's use the following parameters:

- Display brightness counted in "clicks", where 1 equals to minimum, and 16 being the max brightness. No use of percentage.
- Check the time using a watch, and not by using apps like activity monitor, iStat Menu etc. The more precise (hours and minutes), the better.
- Apps opened by the user, as in Safari, QuickTime, Music etc. and how long these were used. Again, the more precise the better.


I really hope this can be a sort of case studio, useful to the many.
 
Last edited:

Le0M

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 13, 2020
955
1,293
I'll start.

Using a MacBook Pro M1:
Safari for 30 min watching youtube
Safari for Netflix, 2h 15m
No other apps opened
Tot of 2h 45m
Brightness at 16 clicks (max)
Volume at 16 clicks

Battery went from 97% to 65%
 

ascender

macrumors 603
Dec 8, 2005
5,025
2,898
How long have you had the laptop - I take it you've let all indexing finish?

From looking at your post above though, max brightness is always going to kill the battery quickly - do you always have it that bright?

I think your battery usage above is to be expected given the screen brightness setting.
 
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Le0M

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 13, 2020
955
1,293
How long have you had the laptop - I take it you've let all indexing finish?

From looking at your post above though, max brightness is always going to kill the battery quickly - do you always have it that bright?

I think your battery usage above is to be expected given the screen brightness setting.
Had it for a few weeks, so no more indexing. About the brightness, according to some people it shouldn’t matter that much, since it uses 4W top.
 

Quackers

macrumors 68000
Sep 18, 2013
1,938
708
Manchester, UK
Had it for a few weeks, so no more indexing. About the brightness, according to some people it shouldn’t matter that much, since it uses 4W top.
Hmm, I'm on a M1 MBP and have just this Safari page open and I'm on 75% brightness and the power being drawn from the battery is 5.71 watts.
In fact it's just gone to 6.08 watts.
Screenshot 2020-12-29 at 00.22.21.png
 

rui no onna

Contributor
Oct 25, 2013
14,921
13,274
Had it for a few weeks, so no more indexing. About the brightness, according to some people it shouldn’t matter that much, since it uses 4W top.

Brightness matters. As noted, I was getting 2W while browsing forums at low brightness (that's my comfort level). I posted on another thread before and with the same workload, power consumption was at ~2.3W with brightness at 25-30% (I use Siri to set display brightness so it's exact) and 7.3W with brightness at max.

Also, the M1 MBA has a 49.9Wh battery. Seemingly small differences in power consumption have a profound effect on battery life.

3W: 16.63 hours
4W: 12.48 hours
5W: 9.98 hours
6W: 8.32 hours
 

sbuntin

macrumors regular
Aug 2, 2011
217
92
Portland OR
Full brightness will kill your battery. Period.

First couple of days I kept some rough notes. I mostly had brightness at or around half or slightly lower. My preference tends towards brighter, but I was in dimly lit spaces, mostly.

No specific app usage, mostly just web (reddit, Facebook, wiki, YouTube) and Netflix or Apple TV. I was using AirPods, so there are some notes re battery life on those. Bit of Mail.app usage. Notes were usage or observations,
20:00 100%. Web, Apple TV (PIP). AirPods @ 98% or so.
21:00 99%
21:20 98%
22:00 95%.
22:30 93% 5 min blanked screen, downloaded small app, setup +finger id
22:45 92% Facebook
23:00 91% TV
23:30 89%
24:20 85% AirPods @ 10%
01:00 81%. AirPods charged to 90%
02:00 76%. —sleep——

08:30 wake.
0830 73% Apple TV, web, Facebook
0900 67%
0930 62% (photos high energy usage in background)
10:00 59%
10:30 55%
11:00 52%
11:15 Plugged in.
 

mj_

macrumors 68000
May 18, 2017
1,618
1,281
Austin, TX
I use automatic display brightness so I literally have absolutely no idea what my brightness is set to. Neither do I care. It's 2020, not 1980. That's what sensors are for.

Battery life has been absolutely phenomenol for me. I use my M1 Air practically every day for 2-3 hours to get work done that I don't need a large display for and that I can do on the couch or the backyard, and I have to charge it less than once a week. As we speak I'm down to 27% with my last full charge almost seven days ago on Dec 22 in the morning (as I am writing these line sit is Dec 28 in the evening), and I used the Air regularly during the holidays.
 
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dmccloud

macrumors 68040
Sep 7, 2009
3,155
1,911
Anchorage, AK
I've been using my Mac for the last two hours both browsing these forums via Firefox and doing some work in Excel with the screen set to 6 for brightness. This machine has only used 7% of the battery in that timeframe, even with a bluetooth keyboard (Logitech MX Keys for Mac) connected in addition to my Apple Magic Mouse 2.
 

ascender

macrumors 603
Dec 8, 2005
5,025
2,898
Had it for a few weeks, so no more indexing. About the brightness, according to some people it shouldn’t matter that much, since it uses 4W top.
Its the brightness.

Brightness is a big (relatively speaking) drain on battery. Don’t listen to “some people” ?
 

icymountain

macrumors 6502a
Dec 12, 2006
535
598
I have no M1 laptop, but can see that brightness has a huge impact on energy consumption on my intel based MBP. So, if we replace the chip with a more energy efficient one, the importance of the display can only grow. Thus, such observations are to be expected.

There is a lot of variation regarding to the brightness level and comfort too. In a bright room, or even worse, outside on a sunny day, maximum brightness sometimes seems barely enough. On the other hand, when I use my laptop in full darkness, even the minimum settings would be almost too much...
 

CheesePuff

macrumors 65816
Sep 3, 2008
1,456
1,581
Southwest Florida, USA
Had it for a few weeks, so no more indexing. About the brightness, according to some people it shouldn’t matter that much, since it uses 4W top.
Whoever told you that is incorrect, the MBP since 2016 has a max output of 500 nits, which will eat right through battery. Try it at 3 notches from max.
 

Le0M

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 13, 2020
955
1,293
Wow! How your eyes can cope with that.. ?

I normally set my MBA at 5 of 16 brightness.
If there is sunshine and the room ambient's brightness is high, I can't see much with 30% brightness.
Whereas at night, if lights are out, even 10% can be too much.
So I guess who uses 20/30% brightness either lives in incredibly low-light apartment (basically a cave), or only uses the computer at night!
 

nobackup

macrumors regular
Apr 19, 2008
200
40
A bit of a **** actually. Your not using it as Apple measures and complaining that you don’t get what they say and also when people say that the screen is the killer and you even go so far as to state they live in a cave. Sorry if you feel offended but that’s what you just did to people trying to help you
 

CheesePuff

macrumors 65816
Sep 3, 2008
1,456
1,581
Southwest Florida, USA
If there is sunshine and the room ambient's brightness is high, I can't see much with 30% brightness.
Whereas at night, if lights are out, even 10% can be too much.
So I guess who uses 20/30% brightness either lives in incredibly low-light apartment (basically a cave), or only uses the computer at night!
I use it at 3 notches below max in a bright room with many windows during the day, and its plenty bright. This is on the MBA 100 nit less panel too compared to the Pro.
 

Quackington

macrumors 6502a
Aug 12, 2010
546
314
England, UK
Full brightness? My word, my eyes just hurt thinking about that. I’m it’s probably because all of my devices and monitors are kept at the lower end...hurts my eyes if it’s too bright.
 
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Le0M

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 13, 2020
955
1,293
A bit of a **** actually. Your not using it as Apple measures and complaining that you don’t get what they say and also when people say that the screen is the killer and you even go so far as to state they live in a cave. Sorry if you feel offended but that’s what you just did to people trying to help you
Damn, chill dude. First off, the fact that brightness would be a battery killer is a new thing to me.
Yet, it's amusing to me how many people are able to use 50% brightness or lower in daily use, since the sun shines bright, and on top of that we have artificial lights all around us.
So, if dozens of reviewers talk about amazing battery life, even when using the Mac outdoor, then I don't think it's too much of a stretch to believe battery would actually last longer than 7 hours.
A funny comparison is the one with my previous mac: a MacBook Air late 2010. After thousands of recharge cycles, I'd still manage to use it at almost max brightness to watch 1 hour 30 minutes movie, before the battery would die.
A mere 5 times better battery than the 10 yo one, doesn't seem that great of an improvement as most people find it.
 

Le0M

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Aug 13, 2020
955
1,293
Full brightness? My word, my eyes just hurt thinking about that. I’m it’s probably because all of my devices and monitors are kept at the lower end...hurts my eyes if it’s too bright.
My eyes hurt too, if the room is dark. But as I said, if it's sunny or there are artificial lights, than obviously me (and you, unless you got cat's eyes) need way more than 30% brightness. At night, for instance, I only use 10% brightness.
 
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Zazoh

macrumors 68000
Jan 4, 2009
1,518
1,122
San Antonio, Texas
I use automatic display brightness so I literally have absolutely no idea what my brightness is set to. Neither do I care. It's 2020, not 1980. That's what sensors are for.
Love this line of thinking. So many problems in this forum can be traced back to folks trying to outsmart the technology.

I see the same with cars. Folks demand a Standard for extra pickup and gas savings. But transmissions and computers can do that better than ol clutch foot any day.
 
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mj_

macrumors 68000
May 18, 2017
1,618
1,281
Austin, TX
A funny comparison is the one with my previous mac: a MacBook Air late 2010. After thousands of recharge cycles, I'd still manage to use it at almost max brightness to watch 1 hour 30 minutes movie, before the battery would die.
A mere 5 times better battery than the 10 yo one, doesn't seem that great of an improvement as most people find it.
Maximum display brightness on the 2010 MacBook Air was 300 nits.
Maximum display brightness on the 2020 MacBook Pro M1 is 500 nits.

In addition, your 2010 Air's display's backlight most likely lost some of its illumanation capabilities in the past 10 years, and the display is at this point most likely down to no more than 250 nits.

If you want a fair comparison set the 2010 to maximum and the 2020 to 50%.
 

CheesePuff

macrumors 65816
Sep 3, 2008
1,456
1,581
Southwest Florida, USA
Damn, chill dude. First off, the fact that brightness would be a battery killer is a new thing to me.
Yet, it's amusing to me how many people are able to use 50% brightness or lower in daily use, since the sun shines bright, and on top of that we have artificial lights all around us.
So, if dozens of reviewers talk about amazing battery life, even when using the Mac outdoor, then I don't think it's too much of a stretch to believe battery would actually last longer than 7 hours.
A funny comparison is the one with my previous mac: a MacBook Air late 2010. After thousands of recharge cycles, I'd still manage to use it at almost max brightness to watch 1 hour 30 minutes movie, before the battery would die.
A mere 5 times better battery than the 10 yo one, doesn't seem that great of an improvement as most people find it.
a 5x improvement is not great??!
 
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