MBA 2013 How Do You Stop The Battery From Charging At Certain Percentage?

There is no option.

Nope, and personally, I'd not worry about it. Just enjoy your computer.

ELYEN01 said:

Is there anyway to stop the battery from charging that certain percentage? Let say stop at around 80%? Or if there is any software that can do that?

The reason I ask is because I is aware that the Samsung laptops has the ability to stop charging at 80%, Lenovo stops charging at 60%, and Sony stops charging at 80%. This is to prolong the battery life according to their recommendation.

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unplug it.
you really don't need to worry about this.

ELYEN01 said:

Is there anyway to stop the battery from charging that certain percentage? Let say stop at around 80%? Or if there is any software that can do that?

The reason I ask is because I is aware that the Samsung laptops has the ability to stop charging at 80%, Lenovo stops charging at 60%, and Sony stops charging at 80%. This is to prolong the battery life according to their recommendation.

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Apple has the machine stop in the upper 90's. They know what they are doing

ELYEN01 said:

The reason I ask is because I am aware that the Samsung laptops has the ability to stop charging at 80%, Lenovo stops charging at 60%, and Sony stops charging at 80%. This is to prolong the battery life according to their recommendation.

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REALLY... oh well learn new things everyday.

Mrbobb said:

REALLY... oh well learn new things everyday.

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Yup, research shows lithium batteries like to be only charged up to 80% capacity and only drained to about 20%. This gives you the highest number of charge/discharge cycles. They also like to be stored around 50% or so, not 100% and certainly not 0%. Majority of hybrid cars will keep their batteries in the 20-80% range for max longevity.

magbarn said:

Yup, research shows lithium batteries like to be only charged up to 80% capacity and only drained to about 20%. This gives you the highest number of charge/discharge cycles. They also like to be stored around 50% or so, not 100% and certainly not 0%. Majority of hybrid cars will keep their batteries in the 20-80% range for max longevity.

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I vividly recall my old Sony LION would last 400 cycles, the new LIONs however last 1,000 cycles(?) and by reading some of the battery techs and Lithium deposits around the world and 787's Troubles Lithium formulation etc I see there is not ONE LION but a few LION formulations.

The problem is, the vendors don't tell us exactly what LION formulation are they using, and it applies to batteries made between what date and what date? (vendors switch suppliers right).

So I take these with a few grains of salt. But OK, 80% efficiency it is, so when buying a new laptop and they say lasts 7 hours, so people re-calculate your expectations, your laptop is only gonna go for 7x80% hours.

Mrbobb said:

I vividly recall my old Sony LION would last 400 cycles, the new LIONs however last 1,000 cycles(?) and by reading some of the battery techs and Lithium deposits around the world and 787's Troubles Lithium formulation etc I see there is not ONE LION but a few LION formulations.

The problem is, the vendors don't tell us exactly what LION formulation are they using, and it applies to batteries made between what date and what date? (vendors switch suppliers right).

So I take these with a few grains of salt. But OK, 80% efficiency it is, so when buying a new laptop and they say lasts 7 hours, so people re-calculate your expectations, your laptop is only gonna go for 7x80% hours.

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Mistreat your MacBooks battery and you'll lose more than 20% of battery life in significantly less than 1000 charge/discharge cycles. Case in point, buddy has a 2012 cMBP that has been constantly been plugged into the wall for the last year at a constant 99-100% charge so the battery has < 10 cycles, but the battery life has already dropped by 8% or so. My rMBP 15 has over 60 cycles and is about the same age still has 100% battery capacity.

magbarn said:

Mistreat your MacBooks battery and you'll lose more than 20% of battery life in significantly less than 1000 charge/discharge cycles. Case in point, buddy has a 2012 cMBP that has been constantly been plugged into the wall for the last year at a constant 99-100% charge so the battery has < 10 cycles, but the battery life has already dropped by 8% or so. My rMBP 15 has over 60 cycles and is about the same age still has 100% battery capacity.

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Got it.

That's one change I've made. Used to leave it plugged in all the time, now When it's 100% and am ready for bed, I unplug it. Apple made it easy with a magnetic plug. Lazyman here.

But the other stuff... is OK, I make enough.

This would actually be quite wonderful.

Back when I had a netbook with a removable battery I would remove the battery when I was doing long work sessions while plugged in (on a netbook yes I know...). It prevented the battery from going through tons of charge cycles every time I plugged back in.

Now that removable batteries are a thing of the past it would be nice to be able to plug in my MBA (which has such a ridiculous battery life I'll rarely use it all at once) without constantly initiating a partial recharge cycle. I often find myself in a situation where I delay plugging back in even though I'm at my desk right next to the charger because I only used like 5% of my battery and I don't want to constantly be going back and forth between 95% and 100%. I'd love to just save that 95% and use the charger but I don't have that choice. I have to either keep wasting battery I don't need at the moment or go back up to 100% and use up my battery's finite amount of cycles.

I imagine over the life of a computer a feature like this would significantly prolong battery life span. But it is probably too complicated for Apple to ever implement...

I think the reason Apple doesn't implement a feature like this is because for 99% of users it won't make any difference. The battery is supposed to retain 80% of it's capacity after 1000 charges - thats a long time. Most people frankly don't keep a laptop for more than 3 years or so before they upgrade, and even if you want to hold on to your Air for 10 years, you can always get the battery replaced for a reasonable fee. It's just not worth worrying about charging cycles anymore.

ELYEN01 said:

Is there anyway to stop the battery from charging that certain percentage? Let say stop at around 80%? Or if there is any software that can do that?

The reason I ask is because I am aware that the Samsung laptops has the ability to stop charging at 80%, Lenovo stops charging at 60%, and Sony stops charging at 80%. This is to prolong the battery life according to their recommendation.

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There is no option for that, and there is no need for that. Apple's charging technology is quite efficient. Run on battery whenever you need to and plug it in whenever you can. You can plug or unplug any time you need to, regardless of the charged percentage, and you never need to completely drain your battery. Just make sure you don't run on AC power exclusively, as your battery needs to be used regularly to stay healthy. The link below should answer most, if not all, of your battery/charging questions. If you haven't already done so, I highly recommend you take the time to read it.