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Is anyone *actually* getting 10-11 hours of battery life on MBP 16?

H

HoratioPerdu

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 28, 2014
37
58
Let's put this another way ...

Is anyone *actually* getting the claimed 10-11 hours of battery life on the 2019 MBP 16?

I just went 2.5 hours before needing to recharge and, frankly, I find this unacceptable. It rises to the level of misrepresentation and breach of contract.

Before I take this up with Apple, I'd like to know if the claimed battery life is even hypothetically possible.
 
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Can you lay out your usage before getting worked up?

Also, what’s your screen brightness set to?

Apples battery life test specs on the 16” MBP page:


  1. Testing conducted by Apple in October 2019 using preproduction 2.3GHz 8-core Intel Core i9-based 16-inch MacBook Pro systems with 16GB of RAM and 1TB SSD. The wireless web test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing 25 popular websites with display brightness set to 12 clicks from bottom or 75%. The Apple TV app movie playback test measures battery life by playing back HD 1080p content with display brightness set to 12 clicks from bottom or 75%. The standby test measures battery life by allowing a system, connected to a wireless network and signed in to an iCloud account, to enter standby mode with Safari and Mail applications launched and all system settings left at default. Battery life varies by use and configuration. See apple.com/batteries for more information.
 
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There is no use case that warrants 2.5 hours of battery life.

Under ordinary, light usage comparable to the parameters listed above I cannot get more than 5 hours.

This is a known issue. If you do not own the laptop you need not concern yourself.
 
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If you guys could spell out your specs below your average times that would be great.

I'm i9, 2tb, 32gb, 8gb video card.
 
HoratioPerdu said:
There is no use case that warrants 2.5 hours of battery life.
Click to expand...
I sometimes visit one website that I can guarantee will drain any battery in that time. On my ten year old MacBook it isn't actually usable, that's how brutal it is. On a quad core MacBook, no problem at all - runs absolutely smoothly until you look at the battery. You might think it's "light usage" but start Activity Monitor and have a look what is actually eating up your battery.
 
Yep, it's possible:

c5gTztf.png


Use Safari over Chrome, minimize websites, minimize WIFI use, read PDFs instead, watch your apps and make sure they don't "run away", force integrated GPU while on battery, etc... and it does last that long.

P.S.: In case you're wondering, I'm running 2.3GHz i9, 16GB RAM, etc... though I doubt specs matter. Usage will dictate more here.
 
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I monitor activity monitor constantly. It's not an app or a website.

I suspect there's something going on in the hardware, or a combination of drivers-and-hardware.
 
HoratioPerdu said:
There is no use case that warrants 2.5 hours of battery life.

Under ordinary, light usage comparable to the parameters listed above I cannot get more than 5 hours.

This is a known issue. If you do not own the laptop you need not concern yourself.
Click to expand...
That’s your response to a context-less post that didn’t lay out what kind of usage or troubleshooting?

I would say if you’re pushing the machine to the edge then yes 2.5 hours very well could be reasonable, hence why I asked about your usage.

I don’t have to own the machine to understand the very basics of troubleshooting. So I’ll ask again for the thread, under what circumstances are you getting such underwhelming battery life? Obviously this should be unacceptable for things like simple web browsing and email, but you haven’t told us what you’re doing when getting such results.
 
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Pardon my curt reply. But I'm past basic troubleshooting.

If you look this problem up you'll see, rather quickly, that it's widespread.

What's not clear is whether anyone is getting 10-11 hours promised - hence this thread.
 
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HoratioPerdu said:
Pardon my curt reply. But I'm past basic troubleshooting.

If you look this problem up you'll see, rather quickly, that it's widespread.

What's not clear is whether anyone is getting 10-11 hours promised - hence this thread.
Click to expand...
How can you determine that? I assume you’ve done the standard SMC and NVRAM resets? Software is up to date?

Clearly something is wrong, as laid out by other responses in this thread. So how can we help if you don’t provide vital information?

The battery life you’re experiencing is clearly not the norm, so we can stop the data collection process for a lawsuit. Instead, how about we help you determine what the problem is so that you can work with Apple from a place of knowledge should you need a warranty claim?

PS. I was in charge of ALL the macs on campus for a prior job at a university, we’re just trying to help you here so please don’t be difficult when we ask direct questions.
 
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Hi NT,

Although there's a chance that something unique to my machine is causing the problem, I repeat that this issue is widespread and documented as such. There are threads on the first page of this forum about it. At least one other poster in this thread has mentioned having it.

My system is up to date. It is new. I've completed the resets. I'd like to avoid a long discussion with an Apple rep that involves re-installing software and disrupting my workflow to no end. There is a credible basis from which to draw the conclusion that this problem is endemic to one or more iterations of the laptop.
 
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HoratioPerdu said:
Hi NT,

Although there's a chance that something unique to my machine is causing the problem, I repeat that this issue is widespread and documented as such. There are threads on the first page of this forum about it. At least one other poster in this thread has mentioned having it.

My system is up to date. It is new. I've completed the resets. I'd like to avoid a long discussion with an Apple rep that involves re-installing software and disrupting my workflow to no end. There is a credible basis from which to draw the conclusion that this problem is endemic to one or more iterations of the laptop.
Click to expand...
Give some details so we can attempt to help! Some programs are absolute hogs. Some websites use the browser to mine cryptocurrency. I never use my 16” (or any other computer) for an uninterrupted 10-11 hours but it definitely has good endurance. In the very least, run coconut battery and see what the capacity/health reports.
 
HoratioPerdu said:
Hi NT,

Although there's a chance that something unique to my machine is causing the problem, I repeat that this issue is widespread and documented as such. There are threads on the first page of this forum about it. At least one other poster in this thread has mentioned having it.

My system is up to date. It is new. I've completed the resets. I'd like to avoid a long discussion with an Apple rep that involves re-installing software and disrupting my workflow to no end. There is a credible basis from which to draw the conclusion that this problem is endemic to one or more iterations of the laptop.
Click to expand...
Have you done an NVRAM reset AND an SMC reset. Yes or no?

SMC specifically deals (in part) with power management on macOS so please let us know if you have or not.

Whoops, sorry just saw you did the resets.

Sounds like you got a lemon, but this is clearly not “endemic”.
 
I really like running CoconutBattery, and setting it so that it displays the wattage the machine is using. After a while you start to get a sense of what your machine normally uses and can spot spikes in power draw. You also get a dynamic estimate of time remaining at your current usage level.

On my 2020 MacBook Air for instance, I find it usually "settles" around 7-10w if I'm doing something light (reading, writing, light web stuff) but spikes up to 10-15w if the brightness is maxed and/or I'm doing more intensive stuff. If I leave the machine sitting idle for a bit I'll see it drop down to maybe 5w. If it stays up above 15w for a while, I go over to Activity Monitor and see what's up.

Here's what it looks like. The 4:04 is the current time remaining estimate, which goes down as the wattage goes up. (When charging, it shows how long until the battery is fully charged, and how many watts it's charging with.)

Screen Shot 2020-07-10 at 2.04.31 PM.png

And here's how it's set up: %r ﹫ %w𝑤

Screen Shot 2020-07-10 at 2.06.46 PM.png
 
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So far, from actual users, we have 3 who are netting 6 hours or under - me, mguzzi and bomby0.

That's the majority.

I'd like to hear from more people, please.
 
I normally get around 2-5 hours while doing game dev but if I close everything, disable turbo boost, using iGPU, Bluetooth disabled, find my Mac disabled this is what I get:
1594408963155.png


Battery is very disappointing but hey its way better to what I used to get on all my previous windows laptops I'm sure it will get better with Apple Silicon.
 
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Hjupter, do those estimates ever actually pan out?

My MBP also gives astronomical numbers - then nose-dives.
 
I was considering a 16", but even 5-6 hours battery life is not close enough to 10 hours for me.

So, disable everything (turbo boost), lower the brightness, and use Safari over Chrome and THEN it can reach that battery life? No thanks.
 
Apple won't do anything, if you read their battery testing details that the very first reply contained, you can also achieve 10-11 hours under those circumstances.

On a i7/16/512/5300M machine with using the iGPU and Safari, it estimates 10:30 on battery
 
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