After updating to macOS Catalina, does your MacBook battery die faster than before the update? Do you find your Mac’s battery running low before it should? Some Mac users have said that their battery life has reduced significantly after updating the Mac. Do not worry, you are not alone. There are two main purposes for this article:
- Provide solutions for extending the battery life of your Mac.
- Figure out why your Mac’s battery is draining so fast.
Also read: macOS Mojave battery drain
Battery drain with macOS Catalina
1. Update your Mac to the latest version of the macOS software. Also, make sure that all of your apps are up to date.
Get In-Depth Battery Health Status Using Coconut Battery. While the above two methods should be enough for most users to determine if they need to replace Mac’s battery or not, if you want even more detailed information, you can install a free Mac utility called Coconut Battery (free, in-app purchases).
2. Simply restart your Mac by going to the Apple menu and Restart.
3. Check your battery health. The general condition of your battery may be poor. We previously wrote an article about that topic. You can check that article.
4. Try resetting the System Management Controller (SMC). Please read this.
5. You may check for excessive energy-consuming apps. You can easily see what apps are using battery & energy on your Mac. To do that, click the battery menu bar icon, find the “Apps Using Significant Energy” section.
6. You can also use Activity Monitor to figure out energy-consuming apps and processes. Open the Activity Monitor app (Applications / Utilities) and then click the Energy tab.
How to extend your battery life
1. Lower your display’s brightness. The biggest use of battery resources is your Mac’s screen. Adjust its brightness. Click the Apple menu > System Preferences > Display and click the Display tab and adjust the brightness slider. You can also check the box “Automatically adjust brightness”.
2. Disable Wi-Fi and Bluetooth if/when you do not use them. You can disable them by clicking their icons in the status bar.
Mac Battery Health Check App Store
3. Optimize your Energy Saver settings by going to the Apple menu > System Preferences > Energy Saver. Click the Battery tab. Optimizing these settings will help you extend your battery’s life.
4. You may want to consider turning off visual effects and transparency in macOS. Here is how:
- Go to the Apple menu
- Click System Preferences
- Click Accessibility
- Click Display
- Click the Display tab
- And check the boxes for “Reduce Motion” and “Reduce Transparency”.
6. Quit apps when you are done with them. You can quit any apps by clicking its name (in the menu bar) and then click Quit App. For example, if you want to quit Safari, click Safari and then Quit Safari.
7. Disable unnecessary Location Services by going to the Apple menu > System Preferences > “Security & Privacy” > click the “Privacy” tab > “Location Services”. You may disable Location Services also. You will need to click the lock icon to make changes. You will have to enter your password.