Whether you are using it for school or work, your laptop is no doubt one of the most important things in your day-to-day life. But it’s hard to get through the day without worrying about how long your laptop battery will last.
The good news is that there are a few simple ways you can keep your battery healthy for as long as possible and prevent it from dying before its time.
In this blog post, I am going to show you a few simple ways that you can extend the lifespan of your battery, and help it work more efficiently.
1. Keep your laptop cool
According to Battery University states that you should never let your laptop get to hot, as it can drastically shorten the life of your laptop.
The best way to keep your laptop cool is to store it at a temperature of no more than 55 degrees. When you use your laptop in the heat, try and be conscious of not leaving it on for too long or in direct sunlight.
If you do need to use it in the heat make sure you are getting a cooling pad with some air vents as well. This will at least help keep the laptop cool for a little bit longer.
Also, make sure you have enough fans inside your laptop to help circulate the air around your hardware.
More ways to keep your laptop cool:
- Keep your laptop on a hard, flat surface
- Don’t use any power-hungry peripherals attached to your laptop.
- Take care not to overload the processor and close any running programs.
- If you must use your laptop in a hot environment, do so for no more than an hour at a time and keep it as far away from you as possible.
2. Don’t Leave Your Laptop Fully Charged
Don’t leave your laptop plugged in all the time. The amount of power consumption that is being collected is too much for your battery’s health.
Plus, if you always leave it plugged in, it can cause an issue when the battery becomes older and cannot take on as much power. One way to stop charging when full is using a Belkin Conserve Socket.
3. Perform Shallow Discharges
In order to keep your battery healthy, it is best to perform shallow discharges, which are charges from 50% to about 90%. Pushing the battery down all the way to 0% can cause a lot of problems.
This includes compromising its life and reducing its capacity. Performing shallow discharges every so often will help you avoid these problems.
Moreover, If you are on Windows, try the BatteryCare utility, which can be used to keep your battery healthy and extend its life. On Linux, TLP and Laptop Mode Tools can both help you with discharging to 90% and above.
4. Fully Discharge Once a Month
A lot of people don’t know this, but recent “smart” batteries are not actually that smart. After a lot of shallow discharge cycles, they can become miscalibrated and start telling you incorrect information about how much charge is left in the battery.
A simple solution to deal with this problem is to just fully discharge the battery (say by running it all the way down until there’s 5% or less power) at least once a month.
This will reset the smart battery and ensure that all future changes you make will tell you how much charge remains, which is important for long-term battery health.
This is something that most manufacturers actually recommend doing as a general rule, regardless of whether your battery ever appears to become miscalibrated or not (in fact, you might notice that your laptop estimates more time remaining than it should at various points while discharging).
So, for your laptop battery to work properly, you need to fully discharge it at least once a month.
5. Activate saver mode
At the end of each day, your laptop battery has a certain amount of power left. When it’s too low to run on its own, you should activate saver mode to keep your laptop battery healthy and at its optimum level.
6. Unplug unused items such as hard drives, webcams
The longer the battery stays charged, the longer your laptop will run. Unplug your hard drive, webcams when you’re not using them to save energy and reduce heat. You’ll also be contributing to a safer, more eco-friendly environment.
To prolong the battery life of your laptop, it’s often a good idea to turn off WiFi and Bluetooth when you don’t need them. Both functions consume battery power as they search for a wireless signal or wait for the device to be pinged.
7. Ensure you have enough RAM
RAM is the technology that allows your laptop to store data and run applications. If you’re not sure how much RAM you have,
Follow this:
- Open Settings.
- Look for the System > About section.
- Under Device Specifications, look for Installed RAM.
If you don’t have enough RAM Or less than 4GB. Upgrade or replace your RAM. It will help to keep your laptop functioning smoothly and safely.
8. Turn down the screen brightness
If you want to make your laptop battery last longer, making sure that your screen brightness is low is a good place to start. When you turn down the screen brightness, it not only helps your laptop battery but also prevents eye strain and protects the screen from damage.
Final Verdict
There are a lot of tips and tricks out there to make your laptop battery healthy and last longer, but the best way to do this is by keeping it away from heat and applying some basic maintenance. Just ensure you’re not doing anything that’s going to damage the hardware or the battery’s life.
