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Should I Leave My Macbook Plugged In

Should I Leave My Macbook Plugged In

Should I Leave My Macbook Plugged In

It is believed that keeping your MacBook plugged in all the time will overwork the battery and eventually cause it to die prematurely. It may not be completely true but constant charging does affect the overall lifespan of the battery. It may not get overcharged but will affect the battery to some extent.

If your MacBook is brand new, there is a chance the battery is faulty to begin with, unable to retain a charge. If the MacBook is still not charging, there is a chance your battery is permanently damaged. If you read this post, you will know that leaving MacBook turned on all the time will harm the battery.

It is entirely possible you could be decreasing your batterys maximum charging capacity by keeping the MacBooks battery connected to it at all times. Fortunately, you cannot overcharge the MacBooks battery by leaving it plugged in all the time, and you also cannot cause overheating or damage any other components. It is probably best to allow your MacBook to partially cycle its battery every now and then.

That is why it is a good idea to avoid leaving the MacBooks battery plugged in at all times. The reduction means that if you leave your MacBook connected to the charger all of the time, you may find that when you decide to actually use the MacBook without its battery, it does not last as long as it used to.

Since each battery loses some charge as the years pass, you may be having some trouble deciding whether keeping the MacBook plugged in all the time is contributing in some way. When you keep your MacBook plugged in all the time, the battery naturally gets worse, since your MacBook overheats more quickly and takes more wear and tear when it is charged all the way. The problem is that, by the time your battery gets to 100% charge, your MacBook is not really using its battery.

Lithium-ion batteries, such as those found in your MacBook, do not like to sit around with no charge at all for a very long time. Fortunately, Apple makes charging the battery less of an issue, if at all possible, suggesting that you recharge your battery anytime you like, since Lithium-ion batteries operate on charging cycles. That is not true anymore, since modern lithium-ion batteries (the kind that Apple uses in its products) have optimized charging designed to ensure your laptops batteries last as long as possible.

The same goes for the newly introduced MacBook Pro models as well (in a somewhat enhanced manner), though they have absolutely huge battery lives. That is why the recent announcement of MacBook Air, which has an eventual 12 hours battery life right out of the box, is truly huge news. Depending on how you tune your battery life, or what you are trying to get done, you might find a single charge of a relatively new MacBook can get you through several days.

Watch this video to learn why you shouldn’t keep your MacBook plugged in

That way, you have got your MacBook charged up and ready in the morning, and then you will have the whole day of use out of the MacBook. Apples Battery Optimization feature will learn when you disconnect your MacBook, and it will time your charging cycle so it stays at 80 percent until you need to recharge to 100 percent. This second also lets me know what are my power-hungry apps, and gives me a nice notification when battery temperature is above or below a certain limit, as well as an alert about how long to go before it is fully charged.

Side Effects
Charge CyclesThe charge cycles of your battery degrades when plugged in for long time
TemperatureThe battery becomes hot so the MacBook gets hot
Charging CapacityLeaving a Mac plugged in and charged to 100% constantly may result in reduced charging capacity
Swollen BatteryLeaving a Mac plugged in and charged to can cause a swollen battery in the long term
Side effects of keeping MacBook plugged in for too long.

It also has Sail mode (sets the range at which you want your battery to remain) and heat protection (charging automatically stops if your batterys temperature gets too hot), so you can keep your battery healthier for longer. Keep in mind, in order to overheat the battery, it needs to get above 95degF or 35degC. There are several ways the battery can get overheated, and if you followed this article closely, one of them is by keeping it connected. While leaving a laptop plugged in all the time is not harmful for its health, excessive heat can certainly harm a battery over time. Avoid subjecting MacBooks to extreme temperatures that can harm their batteries.

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If you do experience some sort of battery damage, indicated by extreme heat or swelling, leaving a MacBook Pro connected to power for an entire night is not a great idea. If you keep your MacBook connected to power regularly over a prolonged period of time, it may be a helpful way to prevent damage to the battery. Having the laptop connected and turned on constantly can erode the battery a little more quickly. Factors such as charging cycles and heat degrade a battery, and leaving the Mac plugged in and charging at 100% constantly may lead to a lower charging capacity, or an over-swollen battery, over the long run.

Sometimes, you might notice your Mac does not charge to 100 percent, even after you have left it plugged in overnight. The only exception to this is if you begin to notice your MacBooks battery bulging, a serious issue that can cause damage (tell Apple right away if you notice any bulging). Charging the battery at higher levels may result in your battery ageing more quickly, thereby decreasing its health (unless it is your first time charging the Mac). Leaving anything on your battery A battery that is constantly connected may result in the charge reaching beyond the max, though you will not know it by looking at your battery life indicator alone.

In fact, just about anything you attach to a MacBook is going to add more strain on the battery, thus reducing its life. Your Mac will learn this habit, and it will delay charging the battery past 80% until the last few hours of the morning, so the battery cells will spend less time at 100%. If you charge your laptop overnight and get to work at 8 am each morning, your MacBook will wait until it is about 20 percent charged before it starts charging that last bit. You can generally expect to get around 500 to 1,000 cycles from a battery before it is down to up to 80 percent of its original capacity, depending on your MacBooks model year.

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Declined means the amount of juice, or the amount of time, your battery can provide your MacBook before it gets to empty and needs to be recharged, may have been reduced compared to what it was when the components were new. My iPhone 11 Pro from last October showed 99% battery capacity, which is a good amount higher than the last phones I had in this period. The free version has just the charging cap and a charging-off mode, allowing MacBooks to operate off batteries, even if they are connected. Optimized charging for battery power needs to exist in Apples M1-based MacBook Pro/Air models as well as on Intel-based models.

Which Macs are too old?

If a Mac was released more than 7 years ago, Apple deems it to be “vintage,” and older than 5 years, it is considered to be obsolete. Service and support are no longer available for outdated Macs. Updates for security are no longer accessible.

Should you leave MacBook plugged in at night?

If you leave your MacBook battery plugged in all the time, it won’t overcharge, nor will it overheat or damage any other component. Nevertheless, you should remember that keeping the battery plugged in all the time may reduce the battery’s maximum capacity for charging.

What will happen if I leave my MacBook on and charging overnight?

The built-in battery management of your Mac manages the charge state of cells inside of the battery at a more granular level, which reduces stress, heat, and cycle count if you leave your Mac power on most of the time.