Im sure we all experienced a moment where we were playing a specific game which was quite laggy or slow and once you plug in the charger performance increases dramatically and the lag is immediately gone. This brings us to the question is it good to charge your laptop while gaming?
Charging your laptop while playing games is recommended since playing games causes your laptop to work harder it requires additional power in order to render your game at top performances, so keeping your laptop charger plugged in reduces your laptop battery from being overworked and overused.
Keeping battery plugged in while playing games will stop your battery from draining rapidly due to the additional resources your laptop uses especially when rendering hardware intensive games. lets take a look at a few things you should know about leaving your laptop pluged in while gaming.
Does Keeping Your Laptop Pluged In Damage Battery Life?
So as we established keeping your charger pluged in while gaming is actually a good thing as it stops your battery from draining rapidly as well as displaying your game.
What usually happens is when your running on your laptop battery and your charger is not plugged in your laptops performance suffers since your laptop has to slow down in order to reduce resources being used and stop its self from draining the battery at a faster pace and stop its self from overheating.
But this bring us to the question does keeping your charger pluged in for long hours drain or damage battery life?
No, first of all, you cannot overcharge your battery since most modern laptops use lithium batteries which stop charging once it hits 100%. After being charged to 100% your laptop will just run off the power cable opposed to the battery.
What Drains Battery Life?
First of all you should know no matter what you do your laptop battery will naturally decline over time. But there are a few things that actually cause your laptop battery life to decline even quicker. The main one being constantly charging and discharging your laptops battery. With lithium ion batteries charging it to 100% then letting it fall below 20% continuously can drain your battery life. Its best not to let your battery fall below 20% before charging it again. Although also storing your laptop at high charge can also be bad for battery life, the best is a happy medium leaving the battery stored at around 50%.
Another thing to note about maintaining healthy battery life is heat. Heat can definitely drain battery life over time so if your laptop uses a removable battery its a good idea to occasionally remove the battery, especially when you start noticing the battery heating up.
Tips for Maximizing Battery Life
Although your battery life will naturally diminish over time there are a few things which you can do in order to prolong and preserve battery life. Lets take a look at how to get the most out of your battery:
- Keep Lithium-ion batteries between 20% to 80% charged [try to never go below 20%].
- Charge a new laptop computer for at least 24 hours before using it.
- Remove the battery while keeping the laptop plugged in tot he charger occasionally in order to stop it from overheating
- If you decide to take a break from using your laptop for weeks remove the battery or if youre using a laptop that doesnt have a removable battery then keep it at around 50% charged before you decide to stop using it for a while. Leaving it un-charged for a significant amount of time can definitely damage your battery.
- If your laptop hasnt been used for a whole occasionally charge it once in a while to keep the battery from getting damaged.
- Avoid exposing your laptop to sunlight.
Having laptop battery with a low battery life can be quite fustrating at times, especially when you notice your battery drop from 100 to 30% after charging it for hours. It kind of defeats the purpose of owning a laptop, which is convenience and it being a portable option for gaming.
This is why we recommend you follow the tips above in order to get the most out of your battery life and keep it from diminishing earlier than it needs to.
Related Questions
Do Laptops Performance Increase While Charging?
You probably noticed sometimes while playing that once you plug in your charger you experience almost no lag and the game renders much smoother, the reason for this is once your laptop hits a certain battery power or once it starts heating up your laptop slows your laptop slightly by using fewer resources in order to minimize chances of your laptop from overworking and overheating. So keeping it plugged in eliminates the need for your laptop to reduce performance.
Does Gaming Damage Your Laptop?
Playing Games will not damage your laptop as long as your laptop meets gaming requirements although like most programs and applications in your laptop playing games can cause your laptop to overheat. Although your laptop heating up occasionally while playing games is quite normal, leaving your laptop to overheat regularly can definitely damage your laptops internal components. But there are many ways to manage and stop your laptop from heating up, read the full article here.
Can My Laptop Get Damaged From Heating Up?
Yes, your laptop overheating can damage your laptop and its internal components. Many things can cause your laptop to overheat but the good news is there are several ways to manage your laptop from heating up. Such as not overworking your laptop with various tabs and programs open while you play. As well as checking your laptops fan occasionally to ensure your laptops fan isnt clogged.
Final Thoughts
So there you have it, keeping your laptop charged while playing games is actually a good idea it keeps your laptop from draininng battery life rapidly and keeps you game performance up. Also since most modern laptops use lithium-ion batteries theres no need to worry of your laptop being overcharged, since lithium-ion batteries stop charging once thhe battery hits 100% and starts using power directly form the power cable.
With that though you should be aware of battery health and the risk of constantly discharging your laptops battery to below 20% and back up to a 100%. This can drastically drain your battery life and cause it to deminish much faster than it needs to.
Its also important to note that your laptop batterys life will decline naturally but there are ways to slow down the process as mentioned above.
So there you have it we hope you enjoyed this article, happy gaming!