Are laptop batteries expensive?

How to Know When Its Time to Replace Your Laptops Battery

• Chris Hoffman

  @chrisbhoffman



• Updated

No matter how well you treat your laptops battery, it will eventually die. If youre lucky, it will be time to replace your laptop by the time its battery dies. If youre not, youll need to replace the battery.

Battery death can seem sudden, but it doesnt have to. Windows will warn you when your battery reaches extremely low capacity levels, but you can also keep your own tabs on its capacity.

Windows Will Warn You

Windows doesnt normally keep you up-to-date with your batterys capacity level. As you use it and it weakens, youll just notice that your laptop doesnt seem to last as long on battery.

Eventually, when your battery reaches a low enough capacity level, Windows will warn you. Youll see a red X appear on the standard battery icon in your system tray and, when you click it, Windows will inform you that you should consider replacing your battery. Windows also says that your computer might shut down suddenly because theres a problem with your battery in other words, your battery cant hold enough of a charge to power your laptop for long when its not connected to an outlet.

Note that this warning was added in Windows 7, so you wont see it if youre using Windows Vista or XP.

How to Check Your Laptops Battery Capacity

If youre curious just how far your laptops battery capacity has declined, you can use a third-party tool to view it. NirSofts free BatteryInfoView does this well, displaying the batterys approximate wear level, the capacity it was designed to have, and the capacity it currently has.

For example, in the below screenshot, we see that the battery was designed to hold 86,580 mWh of energy. However, the batterys current capacity at full charge is only 61,261 mWh. In other words, the laptops battery only holds 70.8% of its original capacity when fully charged.

Some batteries may display more information, such as the number of charge and discharge cycles theyve been through.

Calibrating Your Battery

RELATED: How to Calibrate Your Laptop's Battery for Accurate Battery Life Estimates

The information above may not be completely accurate if your battery requires calibration. For example, we had a battery that reported it was almost dead. Windows warned us that it was time to replace the battery and the battery appeared to be at 27.7% wear level according to its reported capacity.

After we calibrated the battery, Windows stopped warning us and the batterys reported capacity went back up to 70.8%. The battery didnt actually gain any additional charge, but the calibration helped the batterys sensor actually detect how much capacity was in the battery. If Windows says its time to replace your battery, be sure to calibrate it first before checking its actual wear level. If you dont, you may replace a battery thats still in good enough shape. That would just be a waste of money.

Why Your Laptops Battery Capacity Declines

RELATED: Debunking Battery Life Myths for Mobile Phones, Tablets, and Laptops

Laptop batteries decline due to a number of factors. Heat, usage, age all of these things are bad for batteries. Batteries will slowly die no matter what even if you put your battery in a closet and never touched it, it would slowly lose capacity due to age. However, if you never use your battery say you use your laptop at your desk most of the time and it gets rather hot, which is bad for the battery removing the battery can certainly help prolong its life.

To make your laptops battery last longer, read our explanation of battery life myths and facts to know what works and what doesnt.

Replacing Your Battery

If your laptop has a user-serviceable battery that is, one you can remove on your own you can replace your battery fairly easily. If your laptop doesnt have a user-serviceable battery, youll need to contact the laptops manufacturer so they can crack your laptop open and change its battery for you.

Assuming you have a user-serviceable battery, you can order a replacement battery for your laptop model online. Dont just head to eBay and buy the cheapest third-party batteries available buy official batteries from a reputable company. Aftermarket batteries are often built on the cheap, with cut corners and insufficient testing. They can be dangerous a cheap, counterfeit, and improperly designed battery could literally go up in flames.

Theres no point in obsessing over your batterys capacity it was designed to be used, after all but its something to keep on eye on. If your capacity is dropping more quickly than youd like, that may be a sign that you should be treating your battery better. Perhaps youre exposing it to too much heat if you leave your battery in while playing demanding, strenuous PC games on your laptop.

Image Credit: tsuacctnt on Flickr, Stewart Butterfield on Flickr