I'm pretty disappointed with the MBP 16" battery health situation.

[khalitzy]

This ^^^^

there was a big hoo ha about this on Samsung mobile device forums a while ago with similar complaints. Complaints being “why isn’t my battery capacity as what Samsung stated “ etc. after much research it was concluded the battery design and reporting had changed hence the approx lower figures being shown via inaccurate software apps and utilities that reported correctly in previous generations. I believe the same situation to be true here.

Well the thing is coconut battery simply just fetches the data from macOS itself it doesn’t make up the data. You can check the date yourself by going to settings then power.

 

[Fred Zed]

Well the thing is coconut battery simply just fetches the data from macOS itself it doesn’t make up the data. You can check the date yourself by going to settings then power.

Indeed. There some “joojoo ” used that the latter and current generation devices were not reporting published figures on Samsung devices. This occurred after Samsung marketed their devices as being able to keep their battery health capacity for longer than before.

 

[ahendarman]

mine received July 16
Simplo battery : 36 days age, 4 cycle, 98.2% health
i9, 2.3, 32G, 1T, 5600M

Quick follow up, mine is now 91% after only 3 months. I know that I should not worry about it, but it keeps bothering my OCD.

 

[laz232]

A lot of people told me these readings are all guestimations and whatnot, but if that's the case; why does it decrease in my case and many others? and why isn't it 100% like other 16"s at all? Not even once has it hit the 100% of design capacity.

The design capacity is a nominal capacity, expect a few % difference from unit to unit
In addition there is the measurement accuracy:
Coconut uses the Macbook sensors, Voltage & current measurements will have about 2% inaccuracy total, versus temperature - the Macbook was not designed to be a 6 digit multimeter.

Have you measured the horse-power of your car, or the torque? Similar situation - they are nominal values.

The battery degradation is a non-linear function of cycles, temperature and workmanship.

Use the computer.

FWIW my 2018 Macbook pro is at 80% capacity after 580 cycles ( 2 years) - and dropped from 99% to 95% very quickly initially.

Edit: just saw that my Macbook now has the "service battery" warning today (!)

br,
L (bona fides: senior member IEEE)

 

[arigid]

How is the battery holding up for you guys after almost an year of use ? Seems mine went below 80% this week, and might need a replacement soon.

 

[j569mxr]

i have 3 mac laptops.
macbook 12" (2018): 82 cycles, 88% health
macbook pro 13 (2017): 171 cycles, 91% health
macbook pro 16 (2020): 41 cycles, 86% health

 

[foldpages]

84% after 71 cycles ... WOW

 

[Killbynumbers]

I bought my 16" 2019 in April. Almost immediately the battery capacity started falling. For months, it stayed around 92.5%. Today, the capacity is at 100% and I have 18 cycles on the battery.

This makes me worried that the battery may be failing. I had an iPhone that would go from 100% to around 30% in an hour and then back up.

I also turned off the battery health management last week.

 

[David 988622]

So many people -myself included- report that their 16" battery health is less than 100% out of the box. Now that'd be okay if it was 99 or even 98. But for most, it's 95% or even less. Now that's all fine and dandy, discharge and charge and let it calibrate, it'll be fine and report correct readings right? This seems to not be the case for everyone.


My 16" (32GB of RAM, i9 2.3 CPU, 1 TB of SSD storage) came out of the box with 99.7% battery health. Didn't complain, altho I don't remember seeing a MBP with less than 100% battery capacity out of the box. 11 cycles later it drops to 97.8%.. I thought maybe it was a fluke and it would settle later, so I let it drain to 0% and then charged it to 100% and left it plugged in overnight, but unfortunately that didn't help. A few cycles later it got worse, yes worse. Down to 94.9% now at 40 cycles. I tried "calibrating" it again multiple times and nothing seemed to work. I even reset the SMC, the NVRAM, and PRAM multiple times to no avail. I eventually wiped it clean and installed macOS and didn't restore from any backup. Still, the issue persists.


I took it to an authorized apple service provider since we don't have Apple Stores where I live, they ran diagnostics on it and told me the health was 97% on their test which was normal to them... 3% degradation in 25ish cycles damn apple?


I made a couple of posts here and on Reddit, and I found out that I wasn't alone OCDing over this.

My battery manufacturer is Simplo -you can check yours in coconutbattery-, and I realized most other 16" with these batteries have a similar issue/pattern. While DSY batteries (the other manufacturer that makes them) seem to always have a 99%/100% battery health out of the box and even up to 40+ cycles. Although I saw very few DSY batteries with a similar issue to mine.



A lot of people told me these readings are all guestimations and whatnot, but if that's the case; why does it decrease in my case and many others? and why isn't it 100% like other 16"s at all? Not even once has it hit the 100% of design capacity.

I'm way past my 14 days return period since this all happened afterwards, and none of the apple support workers know ******** about this tbh... Got this mac a month after its release.


So yeah, thoughts guys? This issue has been nagging me since its inception, it's been triggering my gadget OCD you can say

I just checked it and I have 28 cycles and 95 percent battery health WTF is this. (MBP 16 2019)

 

[Killbynumbers]

Here's my battery after turning off the battery management. This is more like it. I bought my 16" MBP in April.

 

[BigMcGuire]

I'm wondering if the battery health management reduces capacity artificially? You switching it off and getting your capacity back to 100% ?

 

[Killbynumbers]

I'm wondering if the battery health management reduces capacity artificially? You switching it off and getting your capacity back to 100% ?

When I had it on, my battery capacity was 92.5%.

 

[Valdna]

About battery health management in Mac laptops - Apple Support

Mac laptop computers with an Intel processor use battery health management, a feature designed to improve the lifespan of your computer's battery.

support.apple.com

When battery health management is turned on, your battery's maximum charging capacity might be limited. Although the feature is designed to improve your battery's lifespan, the limited maximum capacity might update your battery status menu to indicate a need for service.



With the management on it is quite normal for the mac to report lower full charge capacity numbers.

 

[jerryk]

About battery health management in Mac laptops - Apple Support

Mac laptop computers with an Intel processor use battery health management, a feature designed to improve the lifespan of your computer's battery.

support.apple.com

When battery health management is turned on, your battery's maximum charging capacity might be limited. Although the feature is designed to improve your battery's lifespan, the limited maximum capacity might update your battery status menu to indicate a need for service.



With the management on it is quite normal for the mac to report lover full charge capacity numbers.

Thanks for pointing out the warning about the errant "Need for service" message. Hopefully, this will prevent people from panicking when they see that message.

And hopefully, very soon they will let fix the system to not prematurely generate this message when Battery Health Management is turned on.

 

[BigMcGuire]

This happened last week with my wife's 2017 MBP 13'. We noticed a replace battery symbol on the top right. Soon as I turned off Optimize Battery - it went back to normal. Been that way for about a week now.

 

[Broko Fankone]

It's better to keep the battery optimization feature ON, imho, if this is the case and the reported capacity is wrong.

This feature will keep your battery going for longer if you use the laptop plugged to the charger most of the time. Reducing max capacity will reduce the stress when it is "fully" charged.

The problem with this feature is how ominous and vague it is. I just wish they told us precisely how it works. The battery loses calibration when it is not deep cycled for a long time. Does the feature occasionally do this on its own (remove the limit and let it charge to real 100% and then let it drain down and restore the limit)? Should the user do it manually? Too many questions that need answers.

 

[Natzoo]

Here's my battery after turning off the battery management. This is more like it. I bought my 16" MBP in April.

That's so strange if you turn battery management back on does it revert? I am currently on Mojave and my 2018 15" with 1 year on the battery has lost 11%, I hope battery management has improved in Big Sur since I plan to update to that.

 

[Killbynumbers]

That's so strange if you turn battery management back on does it revert? I am currently on Mojave and my 2018 15" with 1 year on the battery has lost 11%, I hope battery management has improved in Big Sur since I plan to update to that.

I just turned it back on to find out. It may take a day or two for the capacity to change so I'll post back when I know anything. It's already gone down to 99.2.

 

[Killbynumbers]

That's so strange if you turn battery management back on does it revert? I am currently on Mojave and my 2018 15" with 1 year on the battery has lost 11%, I hope battery management has improved in Big Sur since I plan to update to that.

This morning, my battery capacity is back down to 91.8%.

 

[tunecatcher]

Same here — only 85,7% after a few months of usage. MBP16 2019

 

[Killbynumbers]

I've gone back from Big Sur to Catalina and have battery management turned on. My capacity has been hovering around 97.2 since doing so. The battery charge fluctuates between 89%-100. The capacity was down to as low as 89% on Big Sur.

 

[golfnut1982]

Here's my battery after turning off the battery management. This is more like it. I bought my 16" MBP in April.

View attachment 1421130

I shut it off as well after a couple of months and see the same result. I suppose it's working as intended. Takes a day or two to jump back up.

 

[masi0]

Here's my battery after turning off the battery management. This is more like it. I bought my 16" MBP in April.

Nice! Have you done anything afterwards like reboot, discharge etc. to bring it back to 100%?
Mine has 55 cycles and around 92% with battery management on in Big Sur

 

[4sallypat]

Well after 2 years, the 16" MBP battery (DSY) is now down to 82%.

When will the "service battery" show up ?

Will it be covered under AppleCare+ ???

 

[Killbynumbers]

Nice! Have you done anything afterwards like reboot, discharge etc. to bring it back to 100%?
Mine has 55 cycles and around 92% with battery management on in Big Sur

I just let it run and use it like I normally did and after a day or two it showed the real capacity. After 13 months since purchasing, the capacity is down to 97.5 with 25 cycles.