What’s the lowest wattage power to charge MBP with ?

[Fred Zed]

Is there a slow charger that works with the MacBook Pro ? I always tend to not use fast charging for any of my devices with success . Cheers.

 

[Natzoo]

I wouldnt call the mac book chargers, fast charging at all. It would depend on your usage but for better longevity of your battery, just unplug it at 85% and discharge it to 25% once a week. Maybe coconut battery can tell you how much wattage you are using on battery.

 

[zhenya]

Almost any charger will work, to some degree. Anything below stock output will possibly discharge the battery under heavy load. In practice anything above 60W is probably fine for 99% of circumstances. Above 40W will still charge most of the time. At 10-20W you’ll only really charge while the laptop is asleep.

In practice even the Apple charger is slow by fast charging standards. I’d use what you have or find most convenient.

 

[Fred Zed]

I wouldnt call the mac book chargers, fast charging at all. It would depend on your usage but for better longevity of your battery, just unplug it at 85% and discharge it to 25% once a week. Maybe coconut battery can tell you how much wattage you are using on battery.

Yes thanks, I follow those steps already. But daily. Using the 80-40 rule per battery university’s guidelines.

 

[Fred Zed]

Almost any charger will work, to some degree. Anything below stock output will possibly discharge the battery under heavy load. In practice anything above 60W is probably fine for 99% of circumstances. Above 40W will still charge most of the time. At 10-20W you’ll only really charge while the laptop is asleep.

In practice even the Apple charger is slow by fast charging standards. I’d use what you have or find most convenient.

Thanks. I currently use a 12W iPad charger for my 3rd generation iPad Pro.

Almost any charger will work, to some degree. Anything below stock output will possibly discharge the battery under heavy load. In practice anything above 60W is probably fine for 99% of circumstances. Above 40W will still charge most of the time. At 10-20W you’ll only really charge while the laptop is asleep.

In practice even the Apple charger is slow by fast charging standards. I’d use what you have or find most convenient.

I’ll probably just use my iPad Pro charger to charge it when it’s off. I think that’s 18W with the third gen mode? I’m not sure. Since I’m using an iPad 12W charger on my 2018 iPad Pro. 80-40 rule and still over Max capacity health at just over 100 cycles.

 

[Natzoo]

I feel like using the mac book air or even the pros charger will be good to use? My 15" doesnt draw the full 80ish watts, its mainly 15-40 watts.

 

[Fred Zed]

I feel like using the mac book air or even the pros charger will be good to use? My 15" doesnt draw the full 80ish watts, its mainly 15-40 watts.

Just read the wonderful article regarding battery health and such.

Controlling MacBook Pro Charging Cap with Alfred

UPDATE 10/17/22: I recently updated my 2018MBP to 12.6 Monterey and this technique seems not to work anymore. I haven’t had a chance to look into fixing it. For now, this other app works: If …

www.alexwhittemore.com

 

[537635]

18W keeps 13'' 2020 Pro running just fine for light tasks (web browsing, docs).

 

[jerryk]

Catalina has battery management options that automatically let the system drop from 100% to lower levels while plugged in. These are designed to increase battery lifespan and prevent issues associated with constantly holding the battery at 100%.

About battery health management in Mac laptops - Apple Support

Mac laptop computers with an Intel processor use battery health management, a feature designed to improve the lifespan of your computer's battery.

support.apple.com

 

[Fred Zed]

Catalina has battery management options that automatically let the system drop from 100% to lower levels while plugged in. These are designed to increase battery lifespan and prevent issues associated with constantly holding the battery at 100%.

About battery health management in Mac laptops - Apple Support

Mac laptop computers with an Intel processor use battery health management, a feature designed to improve the lifespan of your computer's battery.

support.apple.com

Yes , thanks. I’d like to be able to utilize that program that detailed in my post via a link to set Max charge level when it’s being charged. I’ll be one of those users that will be solely using the MacBook Pro off charge and not plugged in until it reaches approx 80% charge level then charge at approx 35-40 again. I’ll post battery health results during course of ownership once I receive mine tomorrow.