Is my LG 4k monitor with Power Delivery via USB-C killing my MacBook Pro battery?

Question

Is my LG 4k monitor with Power Delivery via USB-C killing my MacBook Pro battery?

Due to the COVID-19 situation and home office 8h per day I have my MacBook Pro constantly connected to external monitor by LG which is LG27UL850-W. This monitor can charge MacBook Pro so single USB-C cable is doing everything, pretty nice. However just recently I found out strange situation on going while using MacBook on battery. It's losing power like normal from 100% to 70% but below that value various things happen: random shutdown or random drops of charge from 70% to like 20 or 40%. Very often it cannot be booted again without plugging in the charger but after reboot it says that battery is again 70%.

I already asked Apple about that and most likely my battery is almost killed. This is very sad, because I bought this laptop in first quarter of 2018, so battery is 2 years old.

According to system report it has 220+ cycles but only 61% of initial capacity.

Both Catalina and (beta) Big Sur notify me that they recommend the repair of battery.

I bought this LG monitor back in May of 2019 so using it's Power Delivery since then, however even more frequently now that before.

Is that the reason why my battery is destroyed? It should not be like this if I'd charge only using original MacBook Pro's charger or I am missing something.

MacBook Pro 13″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Jul 17, 2020 6:24 AM

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Answer 1

Aug 20, 2020 3:55 AM in response to bartoszfromwroclaw

Honestly, it ought to not be killing your battery. You might just have a bad battery. Then again, I don't know what model of MacBook Pro that you have. There were some models of 13" MacBook Pro in recent history (2016 and 2017 non-touch Bar models in particular) that had a track record of having bad batteries). I am also unsure as to the power delivery of that monitor (I seem to recall that it only supplied enough for a 13" MacBook Pro meaning that it wouldn't supply enough to charge a 15" or 16" MacBook Pro faster than it was being drained by being used; but I could totally be mis-remembering that). But even that shouldn't kill your battery.

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Answer 2

CT

Level 7

24,275 points

Jul 17, 2020 6:44 AM in response to bartoszfromwroclaw

Sounds like the battery went bad. I do not know of any issues with charging via your display. (I do this also, and have no problems.) It is possible that your battery repair will be covered under warranty, but you would have to take it to an authorized service place to find out.

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Answer 3

Aug 20, 2020 3:03 AM in response to bartoszfromwroclaw

I'm having exact the same problem too. LG27UL850 + mac book pro 13" late 2017.

After spending several month while charging laptop with PD from LG monitor my battery have 71% of design capacity at 475 cycles. Laptop can randomly shut down at 16-20 % of battery.

Kind regards,

/Alex.

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Answer 4

Aug 20, 2020 4:45 AM in response to Yebubbleman

I have custom (i7/16/512) MBP 13" w/o touch bar late 2017 (MacBookPro14,1) and I know about battery problems for some MBP's manufactured 2016-2017. I checked my serial against apple support website and found my battery as non qualified for replacement. However stock MPB 13" (i5/8/128) w/o touch bar which was bought at the same time (same cart) is qualified for the replacement. Yes, I suppose PD 60W is enough to charge 13" MBP, but 85W is required for 15".

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Is my LG 4k monitor with Power Delivery via USB-C killing my MacBook Pro battery?

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