Why are people using their MacBook Airs on battery?

[tornadowrangler]

To answer OPs question, "Why are people using their Macbook Airs on battery?"

For me, it's just that the convenience of not having to worry about an extra battery pack every day is worth the several cents a day that it would save me over the lifetime of the computer.

I just checked and Apple charges $159 to replace the battery in an M1 Macbook Air.

 

[oasantos1]

I just use it. I don't worry about the battery or resale.

 

[avro707]

Mine goes flat completely sometimes, I only use it when out and about but in office or home I have way better desktop Macs which I prefer.

 

[Slix]

Cycle counts matter less than the condition of the battery itself. My 2012 MacBook Air's battery died completely (0%, would die immediately when unplugged) pretty suddenly after I used it for about 6 years daily, but the cycles were only about 500 I think when I replaced it. Prior to that, it was going great for many years, and in the last year it started to just plummet and hardly hold a charge. Meanwhile, I've seen batteries on older MacBooks with more than 1500 cycles that still hold a decent charge.

I use my laptop when I'm away from a charger because it's a laptop. Perhaps you want a Mac Mini.

 

[DDustiNN]

Each time you put a cycle count on it, it lowers the resale value of your Air. It also shortens the lifespan of both the internal battery and the laptop. Simple way to prevent it, is by buying and using a battery pack on it when needed. I did this, got an Anker prime 27650mah portable battery bank and for any times that I need to use the Air on battery, I run it off here instead so that I don't put any wear on the internal battery. Much cheaper to buy a new battery bank than a new Air.

Just curious why more don't do this?

What’s the point of preserving your battery life if you never use it? The whole point of a laptop is portability, so you don’t have to keep it plugged in all the time.

 

[Spock]

Each time you put a cycle count on it, it lowers the resale value of your Air.

I purchased my MacBook to use, not to re-sell. It is as simple as that.

 

[filmgirl]

Imagine caring so much about the resale value on your laptop that you don’t even use your laptop as a laptop.

 

[Gnurps]

The best way to maintain any rechargeable battery is to use it. Letting it go unused will gradually kill rechargeable batteries.

 

[boss.king]

Okay I would say carrying an external hard drive is a must just to minimize the writes on the internal drive since it's not replaceable. The same goes for USB hubs as 2 ports isn't going to cut it for on the go. I have a friend who carries a mouse pad and mini lights with a stand in her laptop bag so it's not that uncommon.

Okay, now I’m convinced this is trolling. Why not get an external monitor to avoid damage to the hinge, and an external keyboard to avoid wear on the keys? Why even take it out of the box at all? Keeping a laptop reduces resale value, just buy it and flip it immediately as new in box.

 

[Yimbaz]

Disheartening to see such an obvious troll post rewarded with 7 pages of comments in barely 24 hours.

 

[Astuces iOS]

Why do I have an iPad? To care it around right? Well yes… Actually Mac mini + display will be too big for me and I also want to Cary my MacBook some times…

 

[Technerd108]

Crazy question? Why buy a laptop at all if you are worried about cycle count which as others have said is not as important as battery health. All used MacBooks will have similar rates of battery health and it is understood the device is not new at resale.

Also You try to keep your devices in good condition in order to resell them as a partial way to pay for a new MacBook. It makes sense to think about resale value but it borders on OCD or other mental health disorders to care to a point you would use the device you paid top dollar for in the way it was intended for use?

I think all the battery health automated apps to help or in the OS is a waste. I charge my laptop to 100 percent and then discharge it to around 20% and then charge it to full again. My battery health is still almost the same as when I bought it which surprised me. Just use your laptop and use the battery. Not using the battery even by bypassing circuits will still cause a higher rate of degradation than using it properly.

A battery is a consumable and meant to be used. It is like having a car in a garage for years and never using it thinking it will boost resale due to lower mileage but then end up having a bunch of mechanical problems due to not driving the car at least occasionally. Same is true with a battery. They last about 5-10 years tops in LTPO batteries and they degrade over time no matter what.

 

[mansplains]

Have you considered switching to a Mac mini and separate display? This way, you don't have a battery to worry about at all, and you can replace your display if any pixels die or you experience burn-in. Remember the butterfly keyboard fiasco? Not a problem here, as you have a separate keyboard, ready to replace when keys stop functioning. Oh, and did I mention you can use a trackpad and mouse? Obviously use all three of these wired, as we're avoiding batteries altogether.

You're looking at a computer, display, power supply, three peripherals... 6>2 in this everyday carry, so I win.

 

[DeepSix]

I've had a M1 Macbook Air I've had since 2021, been using daily from the battery and health is at 84%. Definitely noticeable but it still makes it through the day.

Are you draining your battery everyday?

 

[cjsuk]

Each time you put a cycle count on it, it lowers the resale value of your Air. It also shortens the lifespan of both the internal battery and the laptop. Simple way to prevent it, is by buying and using a battery pack on it when needed. I did this, got an Anker prime 27650mah portable battery bank and for any times that I need to use the Air on battery, I run it off here instead so that I don't put any wear on the internal battery. Much cheaper to buy a new battery bank than a new Air.

Just curious why more don't do this?

Just checking in. My M1 Pro MBP is 3 years old this week. It has had the crap hammered out of it solidly for that entire time.

Battery health is on 87% still.

SSD is fine.

Looks like the day it was made apart from some shiny keys.

Works like the day it was made.

And if it comes to it and you need a new battery one day, just replace the thing.

Anyway on top of this the battery actually has a shelf life if you use it or not so you’re just fooling yourself into buying a power bank and a lot of administrative effort for what?!?

Also my oldest iPhone, a 6S has had 2 battery replacements and is 9 (!) years old now.

Interestingly a colleague of mine goes on about all this stuff and how much it’ll cost to replace a battery but at the same time bought an Audi RS5 that depreciated on day one more than he will ever spend on any computing kit in his entire life.

Stinks of no financial sense. Plan replacements into the cost.

 

[DeepSix]

Crazy question? Why buy a laptop at all if you are worried about cycle count which as others have said is not as important as battery health. All used MacBooks will have similar rates of battery health and it is understood the device is not new at resale.

Also You try to keep your devices in good condition in order to resell them as a partial way to pay for a new MacBook. It makes sense to think about resale value but it borders on OCD or other mental health disorders to care to a point you would use the device you paid top dollar for in the way it was intended for use?

I think all the battery health automated apps to help or in the OS is a waste. I charge my laptop to 100 percent and then discharge it to around 20% and then charge it to full again. My battery health is still almost the same as when I bought it which surprised me. Just use your laptop and use the battery. Not using the battery even by bypassing circuits will still cause a higher rate of degradation than using it properly.

A battery is a consumable and meant to be used. It is like having a car in a garage for years and never using it thinking it will boost resale due to lower mileage but then end up having a bunch of mechanical problems due to not driving the car at least occasionally. Same is true with a battery. They last about 5-10 years tops in LTPO batteries and they degrade over time no matter what.

I have a laptop when I need to use it out of the house. Tablet and separate keyboard just isn't the same. Almost there but not quite yet.

 

[DeepSix]

Why don't people put their macs in hard cases to keep it damage free to preserve resale value?

Why don't people buy an external keyboard so they don't make the macs keyboard shiny, again to preserve resale value?

etc. etc.

That Anker prime 27650 battery is like $180, no? The difference between a used Air with few cycles and lots of cycles is probably lower than that. So you spend money on a battery pack, inconvenience yourself by having to lug it around and then in the end it probably won't even make sense financially. Used M1 Airs are what, like $400-500, you're not gonna get that $180 back.

This has to be a troll post.

For our work MacBooks we keep each one in military strength plastic cases with foam inside that weigh 3 or 4 times more than an Air. Heavy yes but it sure protects them perfectly. When I put a 16" M1 Pro inside, the total weight in hand is over 20lbs easy.

The Anker prime bank I got is $250CAD regular but I got it at $175CAD. A good savings if you ask me. Then I had to get a wall charger that could fast charge it at the highest wattage that this battery bank can take. I got two because this prime bank can benefit from higher wattage when charging off two high wattage wall chargers at the same time. Then I got a pair of 240watt USB-C cables for the wall charges and two more shorter ones for the prime bank.

I keep my battery banks until they're no longer good. I had one that I just replaced a year ago and that was because I drained that thing everyday for almost 3 years. I have previous battery banks that are coming up to 5 years old and have less than 50 cycles on them each. They only output 30 watts which is not enough to charge the Air and they're big and heavy.

 

[cjsuk]

I think you just like buying stuff.

 

[DeepSix]

What’s the point of preserving your battery life if you never use it? The whole point of a laptop is portability, so you don’t have to keep it plugged in all the time.

I preserve the MacBooks battery in case of an emergency where I do need to use the battery. Better to have it at 100% than anything lower.

 

[movieator]

What is this nonsense post?

 

[HylianKnight]

Or, buy a computer and use it the way you need too. Don’t worry about the battery life, it’s gonna be fine.

 

[FreakinEurekan]

Each time you put a cycle count on it, it lowers the resale value of your Air. It also shortens the lifespan of both the internal battery and the laptop. Simple way to prevent it, is by buying and using a battery pack on it when needed. I did this, got an Anker prime 27650mah portable battery bank and for any times that I need to use the Air on battery, I run it off here instead so that I don't put any wear on the internal battery. Much cheaper to buy a new battery bank than a new Air.

Just curious why more don't do this?

Because... I'm not insane 🧐

The point of the internal battery is to actually POWER the computer.

 

[v0lume4]

Can someone give me some info on this: at what wattage do MacBooks bypass the battery altogether and power the internal components solely from the charger? Do MacBooks even do that at all? Surely they do.

My ROG laptop bypasses the battery completely at full charge when using the barrel charger. In theory, I could take out the battery and the computer would run off of the charger (at least that is how laptops used to work). However, when using USB-C charging, you are always cycling power through the battery. Meaning, even at 100% battery, you're actually pulling from the battery and then just refilling the battery simultaneously, the same way that phones work. That means you are literally wearing down the battery every second you use the laptop, even when fully charged when charging via USB-C.

OP, depending on if MacBooks bypass the battery or not with their charging ports, you may be putting the exact same amount of wear on your battery no matter what you do. But I assume they DO bypass the battery if the charger is rated over a certain wattage and the battery is 100% charged.

 

[shinkansenwarrior]

If you make thousands of dollars using your MB Air there is no need to worry about battery drainage.

 

[teh_hunterer]

Much cheaper to buy a new battery bank than a new Air.

That's a weird comparison. A more apt comparison would be the cost of a new battery bank vs the cost of getting Apple to put a new battery in your Air.