As long as your Mac battery is not on its last legs, there are several ways and tips that can improve your battery life on your Mac. These tips will even help you get a little more time out of perfectly healthy batteries.
Steps on How to Boost Your Macbook’s Battery Life
1. Turn on battery percentage
Before your battery performance can be improved, it would be better if you could see your battery charge percentage level to get a better idea of your Mac battery performance. This will also make it easier to diagnose when your battery starts behaving badly. For the battery percentage to be turned on, tap on the battery icon in the menu bar and select Show Percentage.
2. Update your software
Apple developers are working very hard, trying to improve our Mac experience. Benefit of doubt should be given to them and start with the absolute basics of making sure your operating system is up-to-date.
Apple software updates often include advanced energy-saving technologies, always ensure your Mac is using the latest version of macOS. A new software release could mean the difference between watching Game of Thrones on your commute and a blank screen due to a dead battery. To update your software, simply click on the Apple icon and select Software Update.
3. Use energy saver
You have seen enough movies to know that if you crashed on a desert island, you would need to ration your supplies. By default, your Mac is meant to be a bit of a power glutton, but it is very easy to command it to ration power usage and stay away from a critical battery level. The central hub for your battery saving options is found in the Energy Saver section.
Here’s how to use it:
Click on Apple > System Preferences and select Energy Saver.
Turn on Automatic graphics switching.
Turn on Put the hard disk(s) to sleep when possible.
If you aren’t using a network, temporarily turn off Wake for network access.
4. Dim your screen
Reducing the level of your screen brightness do have the effect of increasing your battery life, so if your screen is so bright that you feel like you can get a tan, try to drop it a few levels and to add some extra minutes to your battery time. Every body will have to determine the right level for them but if it’s so dim that you’re having to squint and press your nose against the screen, you’ve probably gone a bit too far.
To reduce the brightness level of your screen, click the Apple icon and select System Preferences. Click on Displays and adjust the “Brightness” slider to a level that suits your needs.
There is another way, look for the F key buttons that have a little sun icon on them, as they will increase and decrease brightness. They are normally F1 and F2 on Macbooks and F14 and F15 on desktop Mac’s.
5. Shut down background apps
For your MacBook battery life to last, you have to focus on just the essentials. Though you know that your Mac is doing no such thing. It may seem like it is only committed to your viewing of Game of Thrones, but in reality you know that behind your back it is playing around with all kinds of other applications, which is using up your Mac’s resources and draining your battery faster than what is needed.
For you to find out what applications are running, navigate to Applications > Utilities > Activity Monitor and start closing the items that you are sure you don’t need running at the moment.
This exercise will probably reveal a lot of applications that you had no idea were running; applications that you know you will never need and now want to get rid of them to save on battery life and also make your Mac run faster.
6. Turn off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth
If you’re on the move, chances are you aren’t blaring music from your Bluetooth speakers. Unless you’re that guy on the train. There’s also a good chance that you aren’t needing or able to connect to Wi-Fi, in which case, turning both off will give a nice little boost to your battery life.
To turn off Wi-Fi on your Mac just click on Airport in the menu bar and choose to Turn Wi-Fi off.
To turn off Bluetooth you click on the Bluetooth icon in the menu bar and click on Turn Bluetooth off.
Removal of unwanted accessories and applications is another way to save battery on MacBook. Having stuff attached to your Mac can reduce its battery life. Therefore, if you have one of the older MacBooks, make sure to eject CDs and DVDs that are not in use. They spin occasionally and may drain the battery. Moreover, disconnect external drives or 4G modems. All this will help your MacBook last longer.
7. Clean your system
A Mac that isn’t optimized is a lot like driving a car that is packed with family and luggage. The car is heavier and requires more effort to do everything. That hill, which you usually glide over like a champ, is now an uphill slog that tests your vehicle to the limits and burns up more fuel in the process. So, by optimizing your Mac you will put less strain on it and, consequently, burn up less battery power.
