The battery of your laptop is one of its most vital components thus one of the most important to keep healthy. Although we mostly tend to think of other hardware first like RAM, screen resolution, and CPU power.
When we talk about laptops, we forget that the battery is the powerhouse of the laptop, and without it, the laptop would be anchored to an AC outlet.
Not all laptops have in-built removable batteries for cool-down. Also, internal cooling fans break down after a couple of years.
Should you leave your laptop plugged in all the time?
In order to get the most life out of your laptop battery, keeping it charged somewhere between 40% to 80% has been observed as optimum. With newer batteries, however, the charging stops at 100%, but for older batteries, you wouldn’t want to leave your laptop charging all the time
The new generation of lithium batteries performs better in full charge cycles, thus not letting the battery drop below 40% is a safety measure.
Also, because leaving laptops on charge all the time could cause the battery to overheat - in some models, which is a danger you should obviously look to avoid.
In many laptop models, once the battery is fully charged, it will automatically cut off the power supply to the battery. Thus keeping it plugged in is unnecessary after that point, however, it won’t let the battery overheat in most cases.
Also, because leaving laptops on charge all the time could cause the battery to overheat - in some models, which is a danger you should obviously look to avoid.
In many laptop models, once the battery is fully charged, it will automatically cut off the power supply to the battery. Thus keeping it plugged in is unnecessary after that point, however, it won’t let the battery overheat in most cases.
Should the laptop battery be completely drained before re-charging?
Most of the newer generation laptop batteries are either lithium-polymer or lithium-ion, and they’re designed to have the ability to withstand repeated charge cycles.
As mentioned above, keeping your laptop plugged in at all times wouldn’t necessarily damage your battery, but since laptop batteries do have a limited number of charge-discharge cycles, therefore letting your laptop battery completely discharge is extremely likely to reduce its intended lifespan.
Below are some important tips that will help to keep a laptop battery healthy:
- Avoid discharging the laptop completely after charging it. The best practice is to try to keep the battery percentage between 40 to 80 percent. This is especially true for older laptop batteries.
- Make sure that your laptop doesn’t overheat and the cooling fan is fully operational. The battery of your laptop is unlikely to overcharge and harm itself because of excessive charging. It has been designed to bypass the charging energy.
- Batteries that are charged to full 100% have only 300-500 discharge cycles. Those that are charged up to 80% get nearly quadruple the number of recharging cycles.
- Avoid draining the battery completely, and adjust power settings for best power use in your settings.
- Performing battery backup, disabling unused ports and devices, and selecting battery saving or eco mode will put your laptop into lower power modes and help prevent unnecessary battery drainage too.