Q: Lion - Horrible MacBook Pro Battery Life

Marcos_G  i have the exact same issue with my macbook. I dont think its a Lion thing exclusively. Like you i had my battery changed, and nothing changed of course. Either in Lion or after when i got back to SL, the problem is the same. I bought the mac in early july, and i remember the problem came after i updated SL to 10.6.8 or 10.6.9 i dont remember. So i dont even think its the Lion update that caused the problem.

Just like Doudoucorp and Marcos_G I've been having the same problems since 10.6.8 on a 2.1ghz Core 2 Duo Macbook Air and a 2.4ghz Macbook Alu Unibody. Battery life dropped from 5.30 to 3hs on the Air and from 4 to 2:20 on the Pro. Both computers are in like new condition, the macbook air has 40 cycles on the battery and charges to 100% capacity, the 2.4 Macbook is close to those figures too. SMC reset gave me 20 more minutes on the Macbook 2.4 and nothing changed on the Air. Both are getting at least 3 times more fan activity on Lion than in SL. Rolled back my Air to SL and keeping it safe from the 10.6.8 update for now.

The only common thing I can think of between the 10.6.8 update and Lion is the App Store, but I doubt that's the problem.

Did some more battery timings on my Early 2008 MacBook Pro.

My tests usually conduct of web browsing with Google Chrome, Mail, Twitter, Pages.

Here are my recorded battery lifes. I used the stopwatch function on my iPhone to time my batteries' life.

• September 12: 1:50:29.5
• September 18: 2:58:00.5
• September 19: 2:20:46.8
• September 20: 1:36:34.0
• September 25: 1:58:12.9
• September 28: 2:19:42.6

Those are my times all under Mac OS X Lion 10.7.1.

I'll be doing a test on the battery life under Windows 7 (via Boot Camp) later this week.

I was posting a little earlier in this thread because of the battery problems on my 2009 Macbook Pro. The situation was that even after installing 10.7.1 my battery life permanently decreased to 2 h or less. None of the solutions offered in this thread would work for me.

I went back to Snow Leopard a couple of weeks ago and everything went back to normal. I'm now back to 5-6 hrs battery time again (using Safari, Mail, Pages).

I'm just writing this because I read some posts which said Lion was damaging the battery and even AFTER going back to Snow Leopard, the battery time wouldn't improve.

I CAN'T confirm this. Everything went back to normal after going back to Snow Leopard.

I was also experiencing the higher battery drain with the latest SL version (was it 10.6.8?).

So I would say Apple surely introduced the bug already in SL.

When I upgraded to Lion I hoped this would fix it, but it didn't. Same for 10.7.1.

Apple pleeeeaaaase, fix this bug quickly!!!!

Over 2 months and still no fix, I guess Apple are too interested in the upcoming iPhone launch to care!

sureley trackpad is the rat as said by many users. I use my macbook (white - mid 2010) mainly as a desktop replacement. so i use the power supply everytime. but sometimes i let the macbook run on the battery for a while and recharge it when it is at around 70 %. what i've noticed is that i get around 45 mins per 10% of battery life with moderate internet usage with wifi and minimum brightness. so i should get around 7 - 7.5 hours of battery life. on SL i used to get around 8 hours. Also i have a tip for all users. i noticed when I turned off the dashboard in mission control and also the four finger gestures for launchpad and showing the desktop (as i don't use them), i realised that the battery has gone up slightly. yeah it's a slight difference. you might get around half an hour more on the macbook.

First, reminder (pic) what we have achieved so far with Apple!!! Even elephant is not sure is he in the room or elsewhere?

Today I did not go to work, stayed home to look after my son and I'll be using my MBP quite few times. While I'm writing this my battery (evening, 7.50pm) shows 1.18 of remaining time what means that soon I'll put my laptop back on charge for the THIRD time today. I love my charger, actually just got a second one to have in my study! Who need long lasting battery with many chargers!

PS Did you try Skype video chat on Lion? Best way to drain your battery in 30min! Got a go, battery progress line just turned RED.

Hi everyone,

I just purchased a 2011 MBP 15" 2.2 GHz (with the integrated and discrete graphics card). The laptop came with Lion preinstalled (I have never owned an Apple product before this) The quick battery drainage was apparent to me from the start, even with crumby YouTube videos. I called up Apple Customer Service about this. It appears that the graphics-switching overestimates graphics needs for much of the time, therefore using the power-hungry discrete GPU unnecessarily. The representative did tell me that a fix was being worked on. I asked him if this was just "theory" or was it actually in the works. He told me that the graphics card engineers were working with Apple to correct the problem. A fix should be out "in a few weeks". Keep your fingers crossed.

And for those of us who have 13" Macbook Pro with only one graphics card who are also experiancing battery loss can wait for what...?

I'm sorry. What have i missed? What's supposed to happen on the 24th December 2012?

Sorry my mistake, it's 21st Dec 2012 - End of the Wolrd (link)

I have feeling that if we include all conspiracy and end of the world theorists we may be still closer to our battery solution than waiting for Apple to say a word!

After 2.5 hours of completing some PDF forms, few posts here and 20 min reading news my battery was down to last 30 min! Charge No2. is about to commence and it's not even mid day yet!

I agree with this, yes there is a problem, but please Apple let us know that you are working on it.  I have a new Macbook Pro and get 3.5hrs with Lion.  Getting a refund as someone suggested is not what its about, Apple advertise 7hrs!

lesliefromstockton-on-tees wrote:

 

I agree with this, yes there is a problem, but please Apple let us know that you are working on it.  I have a new Macbook Pro and get 3.5hrs with Lion.  Getting a refund as someone suggested is not what its about, Apple advertise 7hrs!

Apple advertise Up to 7 hours, it varies with useage.