Apple lets iPhone users limit the charging on iPhones to prolong the battery life. Though no such solution exists for MacBooks, this free app offers just that.
The battery packed inside your electronics gadgets — such as iPhones and MacBooks — is a perishable item. Over the course of repeated charge-discharge cycles, it loses its mojo due to electrochemical degradation. When that happens, the battery gradually loses its ability to retain electrical charge.
As a result, your devices tend to last fewer hours, even though MacBooks have a better record at it than Windows machines. As the battery loses its ability to provide enough juice for a sustained period of time, certain performance optimizations (read: slower performance) kick into action. Soon, you are left with no other option than getting a battery replacement.
Now, there is no magical pill to avoid battery degradation. What we can do, however, is somehow slow down the electrochemical degradation so that the battery lasts longer. Apple lets iPhone users do that by letting them limit the charging to the 80% level. Unfortunately, no such solution exists for MacBooks.What’s the solution?
The Mac developer and open-source communities have created a handful of battery management tools over the years. But as Apple shifted from Intel to in-house silicon, many of those projects vanished, while the remaining few are pretty expensive.
One such tool that I recently came across— and which gets the job done — was Actually Mentor. This free and open-source application has one core objective, which is to limit your MacBook’s battery to the 80% level. Though it only works on Apple silicon, it has been forked with expanded silicon support and more features, too.
The app is as simple as it gets. It lives within the menu bar and only offers a small drop-down window as its user interface. Installation is fairly straightforward, and all you need to do is give admin access in order to get it running.
