MacOS Catalina review: Mac goes pro, makes iPad a partner. After languishing in the shadow of iPhone and iPad for over a decade, the Mac gets a wave of upgrades and a renewed identity. Nov 05, 2019 Provide solutions for extending the battery life of your Mac. Figure out why your Mac’s battery is draining so fast. Also read: macOS Mojave battery drain. Battery drain with macOS Catalina. Update your Mac to the latest version of the macOS software. Also, make sure that all of your apps are up to date. Simply restart your Mac by going.
Notifications For Low Battery Mac Catalina Bay
It’s a dreaded message: “You are now running on reserve battery power.”
Or, if you’re using a newer macOS, it might say “Low Battery: Your Mac will sleep soon unless plugged into a power outlet” instead.
If you’re near a wall outlet, this warning usually doesn’t have much impact. You simply pull out the charger, plug it in, and your MacBook Pro is now back to normal.
Unfortunately, it’s not always that simple especially if you’re using an old MacBook which tends to suffer battery issues over time — just like other technology.
However, if this warning is showing up too often, sooner than normal, or the battery just keeps acting up, it’s time to diagnose the problem and find out what you can do to fix it.
The battery in your MacBook might be vulnerable to more issues than you think, so what can you do about it? In this post, I’ll help you find out what might be causing your battery life to disappear sooner, together with fix solutions.
Do You Know?
It’s good practice to regularly check your MacBook’s battery health. There’s no easier way to do this than CleanMyMac. Just click the app icon on your Mac menu bar, it’ll give you a quick overview of the health of your Mac’s battery (see below), storage and memory usage, and Trash size. The app doesn’t stop there, it also offers a collection of utilities to help you quickly find and remove junk files, uninstall unneeded apps in batch, and manage startup items, and a lot more.
Battery life isn’t always consistent. Variations in temperature, usage, and settings can have a significant impact, and should always be considered before any potential hardware issues.
Habits can make or break your MacBook battery life. Whether you know it or not, certain behaviors such as extensive multitasking or using resource-hungry apps are common culprits of battery life theft. When using your MacBook, consider these as potential sources of the problem.
Battery issues are rarely due to bugs. Unless you have the newest software with the newest macOS, Apple has very few unresolved bugs. This means your problem probably stems from something else, usually usage patterns or hardware errors.
Your Battery Is Draining Faster than NormalIssue 1: Overuse (By You, or Applications)
Possible Cause: If your battery seems to be draining twice as fast, it might be because you’re using it twice as much. Especially if you recently made a major change to your workflow, such as greatly increasing how much multitasking you engage in, this could be the reason for seemingly sudden battery drainage.
That said, combining this 'push' with the mandatory 64-bit requirement may be enough for hardware companies to just write new everything for Catalina (user app and device driver). The last gossip I saw was that this wasn't going to be mandatory with Catalina. For example, while you can manually bypass OS warnings to launch unsigned apps, I'm not sure if the same is true for loading of device drivers.
How to Fix:
You can get a basic idea of which apps are draining the most power by choosing the battery icon in the top right of your Mac. This will show you which apps are currently using the most power and help you get an idea of what’s gobbling up power.
You can also cut down on the battery drain by limiting the number of programs you leave idle in the background while you work and reducing the amount of multitasking you do.
Issue 2: Using the Wrong Settings
Possible Cause: Your computer’s default settings are unnecessarily gobbling up energy while you work.
How to Fix:
Here are a few basic settings that once changed, should help reduce the amount of battery your MacBook Pro is using while you work:
Bluetooth: Always turn off Bluetooth when you aren’t using any Bluetooth accessories. Just click the Bluetooth icon located on top of the menu bar and click “Turn Bluetooth Off.”
Screen Brightness: Dimming the screen by a few degrees is both better for your eyes and the battery. If you’re on an older MacBook, use the function key F1 to lower the brightness. For new MacBook Pros with Touch Bar, tap on the smaller-sun icon.
Keyboard Backlighting: MacBook Pros have very nicely lit keyboard, but if yours is glowing in broad daylight, you may want to consider adjusting this with the F5 function key (new MacBooks with Touch Bar is a bit different).
Energy Saver Preferences: Open System Preferences, and then choose Energy Saver. Reduce the amount of time it takes for the computer and the display to sleep to save battery.
Doing these things should help you see a considerable increase in battery life, especially if you were previously using dramatically different settings.
Your MacBook Pro Doesn’t Charge to Capacity/Doesn’t Charge At AllIssue 3: Poor Storage Methods
Possible Cause: If your MacBook goes into extended storage with full battery or no battery at all, the battery will likely suffer the consequences. Additionally, Apple notes that leaving the lithium-ion battery MacBooks with less than 20% charge for more than two days can have a similar effect.
How to Fix:
Because most MacBook Pros use lithium-ion batteries, they should be charged (or discharged) to 50% before being stored for any amount of time longer than a few days. If you’re storing your computer for several months, you should charge it to 50% every 6 months in order to avoid losing battery capacity. Other types of batteries used in older MacBook Pros also have special storage instructions, and you can find out what battery your MacBook uses here.
Issue 4: Wall Adapter is Malfunctioning
Possible Cause: It may seem simple, but sometimes the error isn’t inside your computer — instead, it’s with the wall adapter you’re trying to charge it with. If a wall adapter becomes damaged or dirty, it will be unable to charge your MacBook Pro. If the charger’s LED isn’t turning on, you see sparks when plugging it in, or the computer only charges sometimes, the charger is likely your culprit.
How to Fix:
There are several possible fixes for this problem:
You can learn more from Apple about troubleshooting the MagSafe adapter and charger here.
Notifications For Low Battery Mac Catalina BayIssue 5: The Battery is in Poor Condition
It Shows “Replace Soon” or “Replace Now”.
Possible Cause: Your battery has reached the end of its lifespan or has been physically damaged, perhaps through accidental laptop dropping.
How to Fix:
You’ll probably have to replace the battery. But before jumping to any conclusions, check the status of your battery.
First, click on the Apple Menu in the top left. Then hold the OPTION key. You’ll see “About This Mac” change into “System Information”. Choose System Information, and then “Power” from the left-hand side.
From the Power tab, you can check the condition and cycles of your battery.
If the condition is something positive such as “fair” other “normal”, you’re good to go. But if it says “poor” or “check battery”, your battery will likely need to be replaced.
You should also compare the number of cycles to this chart from Apple that shows how many cycles your Mac’s battery will last before it begins to deteriorate. While batteries will still function after reaching this threshold, they’ll gradually work less efficiently.
If you’ve figured that you need to replace the battery, it is recommended that you go through Apple to have it replaced. The newer your MacBook Pro, the less likely you have the ability to change it out by hand. This guide will help you determine how to get a defective battery fixed with service price related information listed as well.
If you’re a computer person, you can do it by yourself.
First, get a new replacement battery for MacBook Pro on Amazon.
Then, watch this iFixit tutorial for how to replace the battery:
Issue 6: The Battery Doesn’t Charge to 100%
Possible Cause: If it stops charging between 93% and 98%, this is completely normal and not a problem. It’s actually a feature that prevents brief charging cycles from increasing wear on the battery. But if it isn’t reaching 90%, then you might have an actual issue.
How to Fix:
Before attempting a more complex solution, charge your Mac to 100% with the adapter and use it for two hours with the charger connected. Then unplug it and allow your MacBook’s battery to drain to 0% and the laptop to shut down by itself. Wait at least 5 hours, and power on your MacBook. The battery is now calibrated.
If calibration doesn’t work, consider resetting the MacBook SMC (System Management Controller), which should fix the battery charging and indicator. For MacBook Pros after 2009, these steps will get you there:
If you have a MacBook Pro from before 2009, you can check Apple’s guide for resetting the SMC.
Final Words
Battery issues suck. They ruin productivity, produce constant uncertainty, and seem to have elusive solutions. While this guide identifies many of the main reasons for untimely battery depletion, there is a chance that your particular issue is not listed.
If none of the above solutions seem to work, we recommend researching the issue on reputable and active Apple forums such as the Apple Support Community and MacRumors Forums. If you still can’t find an answer, you can always call the Apple support lines.
Have you experienced any issues with the battery on your MacBook Pro? If so, tell us what happened and how you solved it.
Notifications For Low Battery Mac Catalina 2017
Understanding batteries in Mac notebooks
Optimising battery life
Troubleshooting batteries
Understanding batteries in Mac notebooks
MacBook, MacBook Air and MacBook Pro computers come with lithium polymer batteries to provide maximum battery life in a compact space. To understand battery technology and battery life, it's good to know common battery terminology:
Setting up your Mac for the first time
When you set up your Mac for the first time, some activities – such as setting up Mail and Photos, downloading your files from iCloud and indexing your files with Spotlight – can use more power than your Mac requires in general use.
If you have a large amount of data to transfer over Wi-Fi, it might take a few days for your Mac to finish its setup process. It's best to keep your computer connected to a power source during this time. Once setup is complete, the battery life will begin to reflect the regular activities you perform on your Mac.
The battery status menu
Your primary resource for viewing battery status is the battery status menu. It shows you how much charge your battery has and whether it's currently charging. This menu is on the right-hand side of the menu bar:
The battery status menu also tells you if your display or any apps are using significant energy. Click Display Brightness if it's listed under Using Significant Energy, and your display will dim to 75% brightness. Also consider closing any apps that are listed to save battery power.
To see the health of your battery, hold the Option key and click the battery icon in the menu bar to reveal the battery status menu. You'll see one of the following status indicators:
In earlier versions of macOS, the battery status might display Replace Soon, Replace Now or Service Battery if your battery holds less of a charge than when it was new or needs to be serviced. If the battery's lowered charging capacity is affecting your experience, get your battery evaluated at an Apple Store or Apple Authorised Service Provider.
While some third-party apps report on battery health conditions, the data reported by these apps may be inaccurate and isn't a conclusive indication of actual diminished system run time. It's best to rely on the information reported in the battery health menu described above.
Optimising battery life
Your notebook battery life depends on your computer's configuration and how you're using the computer. Here are some settings and steps you can take to get the most from your MacBook, MacBook Air or MacBook Pro battery.
Check Energy Saver settings
The Energy Saver pane in System Preferences has options to help improve the battery life on your Mac notebook when it's idle. For instance, setting your display to sleep when idle temporarily turns off the backlight and significantly improves the battery life.
Deselecting 'Enable Power Nap while on battery power' can also extend your battery's charge.
On Mac notebook computers introduced in 2016 or later, the display brightness adjusts to 75% when you unplug the computer from power if you have 'Slightly dim the display while on battery power' enabled.
The example above is from macOS Catalina. Some features such as Automatic graphic switching and Power Nap aren't available on all Mac notebooks or versions of macOS.
Adjust keyboard and display brightness
Your Mac notebook's built-in keyboard has settings that can help to conserve battery power automatically:
You can use the F5 and F6 keys to adjust your keyboard's brightness manually, setting it as low as possible while still allowing you to see the keys.
Your display's brightness has a major effect on battery life, and allowing your display to adjust automatically can significantly help conserve power. Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, then select Displays. Enable 'Automatically adjust brightness' to allow your display to dim or brighten based on your surrounding's light levels.
To adjust your display's brightness manually to a comfortable level, use the F1 and F2 keys.
MacBook Pro with Touch Bar
If your Mac has a Touch Bar, you can quickly adjust your display brightness by tapping in the Control Strip on the right-hand side of the Touch Bar. To access the keyboard brightness buttons, tap in the Control Strip:
The Control Strip expands, and you can tap to adjust your display's brightness, and tap to adjust keyboard brightness:
Check graphics settings
MacBook Pro 15-inch and 16-inch notebooks commonly include two graphics processors, or GPUs. You might see them documented as a discrete GPU and an integrated GPU. The discrete GPU generally provides substantial performance at the expense of high power draw. The integrated GPU allows for optimum battery life, but in most cases doesn't have the performance of a discrete GPU.
For optimum battery life on your MacBook Pro, use automatic graphics switching.
Turn off features and technologies that use power
Mac notebooks have a number of integrated technologies that can have a significant effect on battery power.
Troubleshooting batteries
A great place to start when troubleshooting battery issues is the built-in diagnostics that are available on your Mac notebook. Learn how to use Apple Diagnostics on your Mac.
If Apple Diagnostics tells you that your battery requires service and cites reference code PPT004, you should confirm this issue by running Apple Diagnostics over the Internet, which uses the latest diagnostic information. To do this, turn off your Mac by choosing Shut Down from the Apple menu . Then press the power button to turn on your Mac. Immediately press and hold Option-D until Apple Diagnostics begins.
If running Apple Diagnostics over the Internet confirms the issue, contact Apple or take your computer to an Apple Authorised Service Provider or Apple Retail Store. They'll tell you which service and support options are available.
If you don't find any issues with Apple Diagnostics, read on for more information about troubleshooting your battery.
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My battery runtime is low
My battery isn't charging
Confirm the correct wattage AC adapter for your computer. A power adapter rated for a lower wattage than is required for the system might not charge the computer reliably. If you're not sure which power adapter to use with your computer, learn how to find the right power adapter and cord for your Mac notebook.
For more help, find out what to do if your USB-C power adapter isn't charging your Mac notebook. If issues persist, reset the SMC.
My battery won't charge to 100%
Occasionally, the battery might not show a full charge (100%) in macOS, even after the power adapter has been connected for an extended period of time. The battery might appear to stop charging between 93 per cent and 99 per cent. This behaviour is normal and will help prolong the overall life of the battery.
My battery isn't recognised
If the battery in your MacBook, MacBook Air or MacBook Pro is fully drained of power, the battery will put itself into a low power state to preserve its ability to charge in the future.
Connect your Mac notebook to AC power and allow it to charge for at least five minutes. If the 'Connect to power' screen persists after charging for five minutes, reset the SMC.
The low battery warning isn't displayed
If you don't receive a warning when your battery has a low charge, generally reported at or under 15%, it might be because the battery menu bar icon is disabled. Follow these steps to enable the battery status menu item:
Portables using OS X Mavericks v10.9 or later display the low battery warning when the battery has approximately 10 minutes of power remaining. Earlier versions of OS X report it at 15% or less.
Servicing the battery in your Mac notebook
MacBook, MacBook Air and MacBook Pro computers with built-in batteries should only have their batteries replaced by an Apple Authorised Service Provider or Apple Retail Store. Attempting to replace a built-in battery yourself could damage your equipment, and such damage is not covered by the warranty.
Most older Mac notebooks have removable batteries that you can replace yourself. Contact an Apple Authorised Service Provider or Apple Retail Store for assistance servicing a removable battery.
Battery warranty information
Your Apple One-Year Limited Warranty includes replacement coverage for a defective battery. If you purchased an AppleCare Protection Plan for your Mac notebook, Apple will replace the notebook battery at no charge if it retains less than 80 per cent of its original capacity. If you don't have cover, you can have the battery replaced for a fee.
Learn more
Learn more about the batteries used in Apple products.
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