Real world battery life of MacBook 12"

[FuNGi]

How can you charge from other places then? Will any USB source of power work or is a minimum power rating required? Would a 10W iPad type charger work? (albeit slowly)

It will trickle charge very slowly if asleep/off but USB to an ipad charge is barely able to run the laptop. Mine said 25 hours to fill the battery while using it.

I am impressed by the battery in this thing (1.2/512) but it really is highly dependent on what your doing. If I'm running Duet display to an ipad, have the brightness up a bit, and am running powerpoint, office, excel, preview, email, itunes, safari, etc. then I get around ~6 hours and its warm. If I'm watching Quicktime videos with the light at 25% on airplane then I can realistically get 11-12 hours, enough for a sleepless red-eye flight across the pond. If I'm reading full screen pdfs at 60% brightness then ~7-8 hours. Plenty for my needs.

 

[zamboni52]

It will trickle charge very slowly if asleep/off but USB to an ipad charge is barely able to run the laptop. Mine said 25 hours to fill the battery while using it.

I am impressed by the battery in this thing (1.2/512) but it really is highly dependent on what your doing. If I'm running Duet display to an ipad, have the brightness up a bit, and am running powerpoint, office, excel, preview, email, itunes, safari, etc. then I get around ~6 hours and its warm. If I'm watching Quicktime videos with the light at 25% on airplane then I can realistically get 11-12 hours, enough for a sleepless red-eye flight across the pond. If I'm reading full screen pdfs at 60% brightness then ~7-8 hours. Plenty for my needs.

How is Duet performance? I have the 1.2/512 and iPad Air 2. I was thinking about buying it but was unsure of how good it will be given the mobile CPU,

 

[FuNGi]

How is Duet performance? I have the 1.2/512 and iPad Air 2. I was thinking about buying it but was unsure of how good it will be given the mobile CPU,

It works fine for an additional screen. I am using the same machine with an iPad Air and notice some occasionaly lag but I only have it on the 30 Ghz refresh rate to save processing power. Best for a document, calendar, email, presenter view in powerpoint or keynote, etc. Well worth the $9.99 for the app.

 

[kingofwale]

I take mine everywhere I go. and I get around 6 and half hours on wifi (websites, nothing intensive).

but then again, my battery is currently at 82% right now after 200 cycles.

 

[xDKP]

I take mine everywhere I go. and I get around 6 and half hours on wifi (websites, nothing intensive).

but then again, my battery is currently at 82% right now after 200 cycles.

Wow I get a lot more - Yes it's a bit newer than yours but shouldn't degrade so fast? My other MacBooks haven't.

 

[polee]

I take mine everywhere I go. and I get around 6 and half hours on wifi (websites, nothing intensive).

but then again, my battery is currently at 82% right now after 200 cycles.

I am sure Apple will replace your battery if bring it for servicing or does it need to be 80 percent or below?

 

[kingofwale]

Wow I get a lot more - Yes it's a bit newer than yours but shouldn't degrade so fast? My other MacBooks haven't.

none of my previous 4 apple laptops showed signe of this. i will bring it in as soon as it stablizes at below 80.

currently at 81

 

[xDKP]

none of my previous 4 apple laptops showed signe of this. i will bring it in as soon as it stablizes at below 80.

currently at 81

Just downloaded Coconut Battery myself and it lists 92% after just 17 cycles - a bit fast, so will keep an eye on it

 

[geraldem]

Just downloaded Coconut Battery myself and it lists 92% after just 17 cycles - a bit fast, so will keep an eye on it

Are you seeing a downgrade in actual battery life though? What is your average #of hours that you are getting each day?

 

[xDKP]

Are you seeing a downgrade in actual battery life though? What is your average #of hours that you are getting each day?

No it's pretty great the battery life. I were at the office yesterday for seven hours and still had 25% left when I went home.

 

[geraldem]

No it's pretty great the battery life. I were at the office yesterday for seven hours and still had 25% left when I went home.

That is really good. I have been wrestling with getting one, but the battery life question has been huge on my mind. Really want to get 7+ hours on a flight...sounds like that is a no brainier. Thanks

 

[xDKP]

That is really good. I have been wrestling with getting one, but the battery life question has been huge on my mind. Really want to get 7+ hours on a flight...sounds like that is a no brainier. Thanks

Yeah it obviously depends a lot of what you do in that time - I work a lot in the office programs, outlook and the browser - So nothing intensive other than a video clip or two once in a while

 

[geraldem]

Yeah it obviously depends a lot of what you do in that time - I work a lot in the office programs, outlook and the browser - So nothing intensive other than a video clip or two once in a while

Have you tried to watch video on a long flight? I am a very similar user, office, outlook and browser. I was also wanting to use this as my media consumption device for flights.

 

[FuNGi]

Have you tried to watch video on a long flight? I am a very similar user, office, outlook and browser. I was also wanting to use this as my media consumption device for flights.

I have. If they are mp4's they play with Quicktime. Quicktime is optimized on the rMB and you will realistically get 11 hours of flight time with the LED down to about 25%.

 

[geraldem]

I have. If they are mp4's they play with Quicktime. Quicktime is optimized on the rMB and you will realistically get 11 hours of flight time with the LED down to about 25%.

Awesome..great pointer. With iTunes, that is the 9 hour estimate that Apple states right?

 

[xDKP]

I have. If they are mp4's they play with Quicktime. Quicktime is optimized on the rMB and you will realistically get 11 hours of flight time with the LED down to about 25%.

Great! I'm going on a pretty long journey start of 2016, so this will definitely be a much valued feature. Loving this baby more every day, and if the screen is going to be a tad too small for long days down the line, hopefully USB monitors will be everywhere

 

[Z3man]

I haven't measured what i get doing day to day tasks, but i did do a little test playing music in iTunes and i got 10.5 hours at full volume with 4% still left.

 

[geraldem]

I haven't measured what i get doing day to day tasks, but i did do a little test playing music in iTunes and i got 10.5 hours at full volume with 4% still left.

that is great. more than you need really as typically you will plug it in at times during the day.

 

[Roman2K~]

Bought mine on 24th of June and battery life still the same at 9-10 hours. Granted, my usage is very frugal:

• latest El Capitan
• mainly programming while listening to music
  • working in Terminal tmux+nvim+various server daemons
  • music in VLC or an HTML5 player in a Safari tab, SoundCloud or YouTube
• some reading/browsing in Safari: RSS, YouTube, Facebook
  • no Flash
  • uBlock
• some video watching in mpv
• MenuMeters

Goes without saying: extremely happy!

 

[xDKP]

Bought mine on 24th of June and battery life still the same at 9-10 hours. Granted, my usage is very frugal:

• latest El Capitan
• mainly programming while listening to music
  • working in Terminal tmux+nvim+various server daemons
  • music in VLC or an HTML5 player in a Safari tab, SoundCloud or YouTube
• some reading/browsing in Safari: RSS, YouTube, Facebook
  • no Flash
• some video watching in mpv
• MenuMeters

Goes without saying: extremely happy!

On a side note: Does flash really still suck that much, that I need to uninstall it again? A website wanted me to install it to view their ad-movie and half way i needed to exit the full screen view because it started to lag - damn flash ****

 

[Roman2K~]

On a side note: Does flash really still suck that much, that I need to uninstall it again? A website wanted me to install it to view their ad-movie and half way i needed to exit the full screen view because it started to lag - damn flash ****

No idea. Don't even want to know, to be honest... wouldn't touch that beast with a 10 ft pole

 

[geraldem]

No idea. Don't even want to know, to be honest... wouldn't touch that beast with a 10 ft pole

My experience on a Surface is horrible with Flash. With flash enabled sites, especially with ads, it just kills the battery. So I just run ad blockers or uninstall flash all together. It really sucks

 

[xDKP]

My experience on a Surface is horrible with Flash. With flash enabled sites, especially with ads, it just kills the battery. So I just run ad blockers or uninstall flash all together. It really sucks

Really mind-blowing that they really haven't fixed that junk software after all these years... Luckily the iPhone kickstarted a move away from that crap - uninstalled it again shortly after installing it - just not worth it

 

[pika2000]

I really hope Skylake update will give better battery life for the retina Macbook. The current one imo is not good enough. With that kind of portability, I expect an iPad-like battery life on normal laptop usage. The benchmark to beat is the 13" Macbook Air. 5 to 6 hours is not good enough. I want it to be at least 12 hours on regular usage.

 

[David58117]

I really hope Skylake update will give better battery life for the retina Macbook. The current one imo is not good enough. With that kind of portability, I expect an iPad-like battery life on normal laptop usage. The benchmark to beat is the 13" Macbook Air. 5 to 6 hours is not good enough. I want it to be at least 12 hours on regular usage.

I get like 9-10 hours on mine..