Who has a high battery cycle count?

[h.gilbert]

My 2016 MBP currently is on it's second battery (Apple store replacement) at 904 cycles. It recently started to say service recommended and battery life is about 3 hours at max brightness. I'm planning on keeping it until the M3 Macbooks come out so likely another year.

Anyone here over 1k cycles? How's battery life?

 

[MacManiac76]

Caring about battery cycles is ridiculous up to a point when buying a laptop computer. Why buy something portable if you are just going to use it plugged in 99% of the time. I have only had my 2023 MacBook Pro for a couple months and have 27 cycles already. If I use up the battery in a shorter period of time than I thought I would have, I will just get a new battery put in. It's not like the laptop becomes useless just because the battery's capacity is below 80% after 2-3 years.

 

[h.gilbert]

Caring about battery cycles is ridiculous up to a point when buying a laptop computer. Why buy something portable if you are just going to use it plugged in 99% of the time. I have only had my 2023 MacBook Pro for a couple months and have 27 cycles already. If I use up the battery in a shorter period of time than I thought I would have, I will just get a new battery put in. It's not like the laptop becomes useless just because the batteries capacity is below 80% after 2-3 years.

You completely missed the point

 

[Graham Caracas]

You don't present a specific point, just ramble on about your fear of cycle counts.

 

[h.gilbert]

You don't present a specific point, just ramble on about your fear of cycle counts.

Ok, 4 lines is rambling lol?

I'll spell it out. I'm waiting for the M3 which will likely come out in a year. I don't know what to expect from battery life in the coming year or so, so I'm asking those with higher cycle counts what their battery life is. I know not all batteries are the same, but just wanted to get an idea. For example are those on over 1000 cycles getting battery life in the region of less than an hour or around a couple of hours.

 

[LeeW]

You don't present a specific point, just ramble on about your fear of cycle counts.

I saw a point and a question that you didn't.

 

[h.gilbert]

I saw a point and a question that you didn't.

Thank you lol. I thought it was quite obvious as to what I was asking.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Thank you lol. I thought it was quite obvious as to what I was asking.

I saw charge cycle counts in your post and as someone who could talk all day about batteries, I like your post.

Sadly, I don't meet your request to get posters who have +1k cycles. I often use my laptops in clamshell mode and use AlDente to keep the charge % low and run off wall power almost exclusively (unless I'm on a work trip).

My only comment is that usage is going to vary wildly between a sample of users who have 1k+ cycles. Someone who uses an adblocker and reads books with brightness way down will get many hours while those who program with a compiler and have databases churning constantly will not last as long.

Not entirely related: My wife's experience with a failing battery just under 3 years of ownership, it starts diving REALLY quickly. We got the service notification and because of covid couldn't get a replacement until 4 months later - and by then the battery was dropping fast and didn't last very long. (It was replaced for free with AppleCare+).

The cost of replacing batteries in these laptops (often needing a top end case replacement) makes it very inhibitive to replace the battery.

Most people I know (family, etc) use their laptops a lot at their desk so their cycle count is pretty low.

My 2020 MBP 13' i7 is on 45 cycles while my 16' MBP M1 Max is in the 20s.

Hope we get more 1k+ cycle posters!

 

[h.gilbert]

I saw charge cycle counts in your post and as someone who could talk all day about batteries, I like your post.

Sadly, I don't meet your request to get posters who have +1k cycles. I often use my laptops in clamshell mode and use AlDente to keep the charge % low and run off wall power almost exclusively (unless I'm on a work trip).

My only comment is that usage is going to vary wildly between a sample of users who have 1k+ cycles. Someone who uses an adblocker and reads books with brightness way down will get many hours while those who program with a compiler and have databases churning constantly will not last as long.

Not entirely related: My wife's experience with a failing battery just under 3 years of ownership, it starts diving REALLY quickly. We got the service notification and because of covid couldn't get a replacement until 4 months later - and by then the battery was dropping fast and didn't last very long. (It was replaced for free with AppleCare+).

The cost of replacing batteries in these laptops (often needing a top end case replacement) makes it very inhibitive to replace the battery.

Most people I know (family, etc) use their laptops a lot at their desk so their cycle count is pretty low.

My 2020 MBP 13' i7 is on 45 cycles while my 16' MBP M1 Max is in the 20s.

Hope we get more 1k+ cycle posters!

Agreed there's definitely a lot of variability. 1,000 full battery cycles where the user hasn't dipped below 20% is going to yield better battery degradation than someone on 1,000 cycles that lets their battery die all the time.

I've also noticed that the degradation is not very linear too. Seems like within the last 100 cycles battery life has taken a noticeable hit.

My 2016 has a slew of other problems too, namely the webcam not working despite a replacement screen a few years ago because of the same flexgate problem. Not worth getting an OEM battery even if Apple will still replace it (which I doubt they do anymore). Third party batteries always seem like a gamble looking at the reviews. I'll just hold out until M3, fingers crossed.

 

[G.GTis]

I have an early 2015 model, it is currently at 1005 cycles and the health is at 81%. I can use it for 2-4 hours depending on usage.

 

[MacManiac76]

You completely missed the point

No I didn't. I was agreeing with you about high battery cycle counts that should be praised in my opinion. I was just making a general statement about the obsession with keeping battery cycles really low for an absurd reason by many that go overboard to do it.

 

[h.gilbert]

No I didn't. I was agreeing with you about high battery cycle counts that should be praised in my opinion. I was just making a general statement about the obsession with keeping battery cycles really low for an absurd reason by many that go overboard to do it.

ok, well either way it's neither here nor there

 

[h.gilbert]

I have an early 2015 model, it is currently at 1005 cycles and the health is at 81%. I can use it for 2-4 hours depending on usage.

Thanks, that just reminded me to check coconut battery and their graph tool:

Not sure what's going on past 900 cycles, I guess the variance becomes quite large after that.

 

[MacManiac76]

ok, well either way it's neither here nor there

Whatever.

 

[saudor]

I saw a point and a question that you didn't.

Same lol. Looking at that other person's signature, they upgrade every 1-2 years so battery cycles is irrelevant. For the rest of us who keep our stuff longer, these things are important.

To answer OP, it depends. If a battery is kept in its ideal state (<80%), it will last longer. You could use something like AlDente so it doesnt charge above 80% until you actually need those extra 20% (not sure if it works on non intel though as it's been a while since I had laptops) I've kept mine on a charger and it got warm a lot due to the intensive tasks and at 400 cycles it was already dropping below 80% health. Friend didnt. Even with almost 2k charges, it was 90%+ health and still lasted a long time

 

[arcite]

My 2015 has 1370 cycles, 44% capacity...although that probably isn't accurate, as it only lasts around 10 minutes unplugged. It's not worth it to update the battery; It will soon be replaced with a new pro.

 

[h.gilbert]

My 2015 has 1370 cycles, 44% capacity...although that probably isn't accurate, as it only lasts around 10 minutes unplugged. It's not worth it to update the battery; It will soon be replaced with a new pro.

Excellent, that's what I like to hear

 

[sumva]

My 13" 2020 intel 4 port MBP is still running the factory battery and is currently at 988 cycles. Coconut battery says ~81%. I had the apple store run the battery diagnostic and it showed up at 83%. Happy that it is still within "spec" given the cycle count but the battery life is poor...lasts on average ~2.5hrs for my use-case. I do have AC+ so hopefully it will eventually trigger the service battery message so that it can be replaced under AC.