Laptop Battery, Does It Hurt the Battery to Use External AC Power?

Bigfoot · 31 Oct 2019

I haven't used my laptop much yet, only a little bit to set up some bookmarks, wallpaper, etc. Every time I use it, I plug it into the wall. I'm at home so it's not inconvenient, and I figured it would save on the battery life.

Is it harmful to the battery to keep plugging in the laptop, instead of letting it run off the battery? It's a Lithium-ion battery and HP laptop. Thanks for any advice.

EdTittel · 31 Oct 2019

The battery will deteriorate over time no matter what you do. But if you consistently run off A/C power and the battery is removable, it will degrade more slowly than if you leave it charging all the time. Depends on your laptop maker, but many bigger mfgrs have tools like the Battery Charge Threshold item from Lenovo (works on my X380 Yogas and X1 Extreme):

Laptop Battery, Does It Hurt the Battery to Use External AC Power?-image.png

You may or may not have access to such stuff for your laptop depending on what you've got and how old it is.
HTH,
--Ed--

AMDMan2016 · 31 Oct 2019

What i do since i got my HP Omen Gaming Laptop, is very light gaming on that machine off and on A/C power, then alernate between days i use it on battery a while, and days i use it on A/C Power, so far HP battery condition check with HP Support Assistant says it's just fine still after about 2 years of using it.

Intel I7 7700HQ, Intel Graphics UHD 630/Nvidia Geforce 1050TI, 8gb of ram currently (eventually upgrading laptop to 16gb) and 128gb NVME m.2 ssd((upgrading this at some point to Samsung 250gb at least) and 1Tb storage

May use it more after the real life move til Cable internet is all setup, and Desktop resetup

mrgeek · 31 Oct 2019

My battery is almost never in my laptop. Only put it in if I anticipate a storm power outage, will take it to airport or mall or while doing Windows updates, in case power goes out. You do need to check it's level if you ARE going to use it, as it will discharge even if not in use.

AMDMan2016 · 31 Oct 2019

Mine is built in for my HP Omen, unless i wanna unscrew all 10 screws to remove it, i don't even know if it would work with it removed.

So just makes sure i keep it cool, don't game too long on that machine, unlike my Desktop, make sure everything up to date, and so on.

Bigfoot · 31 Oct 2019

EdTittel said:

The battery will deteriorate over time no matter what you do. But if you consistently run off A/C power and the battery is removable, it will degrade more slowly than if you leave it charging all the time. Depends on your laptop maker, but many bigger mfgrs have tools like the Battery Charge Threshold item from Lenovo (works on my X380 Yogas and X1 Extreme):

You may or may not have access to such stuff for your laptop depending on what you've got and how old it is

Thanks Ed, this is my very first laptop and it's brand new. I don't think I'd want to try and remove the battery, but I would plug it in less often if it was the smart thing to do.

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/hp-17-3...?skuId=6356671

--Ed--[/QUOTE]

- - - Updated - - -

AMDMan2016 said:

Mine is built in for my HP Omen, unless i wanna unscrew all 10 screws to remove it, i don't even know if it would work with it removed.

So just makes sure i keep it cool, don't game too long on that machine, unlike my Desktop, make sure everything up to date, and so on.

I don't game at all, don't even stream things very often, just gentle simple regular use, forums, web browsing, emails, etc.

Fabler2 · 31 Oct 2019

Keep the HP Support Assistant app and you can keep an eye on the Battery.

Laptop Battery, Does It Hurt the Battery to Use External AC Power?-bat-check.png

Try3 · 31 Oct 2019

I have one battery that I have kept fully charged for the year since I got it and it still charges to its full Design capacity. There have been a few mistakes when I've used it on battery because I have forgotten to connect my Powerbank [that connects to my AC power input socket] so I would have expected some degradation.

I have another that had been in normal use [sometimes AC, sometimes battery power] for a year but has since been kept fully charged for the last two years. During its initial year of normal use, it degraded to 80% of its Design capacity. In the two years since I started keeping it fully charged it has only degraded a further 14%. Again, there have been a few mistakes when I've used it on battery because I have forgotten to connect my Powerbank.

So keeping my batteries fully charged means that they are both likely to last longer than the computer I use them in.

[I do not even take the precautions used by the utilities Ed referred to, I just let Windows charge them fully.]

Denis

Steve C · 01 Nov 2019

My HP ProBook has a BIOS option to limit charging to 80% which HP claims maximises battery life

johnpd · 01 Nov 2019

My Dell XPS laptop has an option in BIOS (and accessible in one of their management apps) to set a maximum charge level and a minimum recharge level. You can set it to only charge up to say 80% and recharge when it drops to 50%. The numbers can be set to whatever you want. If you need a full charge on the battery, you can set it to do a full charge then change it back to safer numbers. I don't know if your HP has these options. The XPS laptops have been having a terrible time with batteries dying shortly after a year of ownership. If you are continually slightly discharging then topping the battery off, I can shorten the battery's life.

JohnD