Extend your laptop’s battery life

The Low Battery sign comes on. Your laptop needs charging. Here’s how you can extend the useful life of  the battery with some simple tips and tricks.

1. Charge and Discharge

There used to be a time when everyone thought that it would be good to completely discharge a battery and then recharge it from zero. However, modern batteries do not work like that anymore. The best way to preserve your battery life is to charge the battery to about 80% and then let it discharge to about 40% before charging again. Studies by Battery University have shown that a battery charged from zero to 100% goes about 300-500 times in its lifetime. However, a battery following this 80-40 rule, can be charged about 850-1500 times. It is good to make the pattern of charging as a regular habit.

2. Battery saver mode

Windows offers you the convenient feature of seeing your battery level in the taskbar. Click on the laptop battery level indicator and activate all the power-saving features. There will not be any significant difference in the performance of the laptop. Additionally, check on the Power & sleep settings by typing Power & sleep in the Search bar. Choose the minimum amount of time required before your display turns off or your laptop goes into sleep mode when working on battery. This will help conserve your battery power.

3. Close unwanted apps 

Are you the kind who is good at multi-tasking and has many apps open on your system? Sometimes that isn’t such a good idea, especially when it comes to battery life. Multiple processes running in the background will consume battery life more quickly. Check on all open windows and close down ones that you have forgotten about. Apps like Spotify and Adobe run in the background and take up more power than you think.

4. Heat makes waste

It may be called a laptop, but it definitely not meant to be kept on your lap. Physically blocking the ventilation ports heats up your device and is sure way to destroy your battery. Don’t keep the laptop on a pillow or a blanket either. Use your device on a firm and flat surface – like a desk or a table. Dust build-up is another problem. Once in a while, clean the laptop keys and vents with a can of compressed air, easily available in your local hardware store. Avoid over-heating your laptop, in order for it to serve you well.

Hope you follow these tips and tricks to extend your laptop battery life!

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