Should I remove battery from laptop when not in use

This is one of those questions that comes up periodically and to be honest, theres no right or wrong answer. For every answer that there is out there, there are arguments against it. It tends to be controversial. And when I make my case here, I know there are going to be people who disagree with me.

I think that whatever you do will be just fine. Ill explain why.

Remove the battery to lengthen its life

Theres always a possibility that leaving your battery in the machine when its plugged in may shorten the life of your battery.

Actually, its better for the batteries to get drained, but not all the way to zero. Ideally, you want to drain them to 20% or 50% so that they get recharged. If theyre kept at maximum or nearly full charged all the time, they dont necessarily hold the charge as long as they would when they were new.

Now, that being said, its not as bad as it once was. While battery technology is not increasing in terms of capacity, they are improving battery memory and lifespan issues. For example, in Macintosh laptops, you cant replace the battery it isnt even removable.

With my Macs and PC laptops, Ive left the battery in all the time. Over the years, battery lifespan does go down; for example, a three-hour battery becomes an hour and a half battery, but that kind of reduction is over two to three years.

Would it have been an hour and a half battery if I discharged periodically? Probably not. It would only be a two-hour battery. Some degradation just occurs naturally. By taking the battery out, youre probably slowing the that degradation a little bit.

Leaving the battery in to protect the laptop

The one thing that I like about leaving the battery in the laptop is that its like having an uninterrupted power supply.

If the power ever goes out, say like in a thunderstorm, your desktop shuts down. You lose your work if you havent saved and you have to wait until the power comes back.

On the other hand, if your laptop has a battery [even a very old, very worn-out one that holds a charge for only 10 or 15 minutes], that still acts as enough of a power supply to protect your laptop from power spikes, power loss, and similar issues. Thats kind of a rationalization, but its one advantage to having the battery.

So, are you shortening the lifespan somewhat? Probably. Is it a big deal? Not in my opinion.

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