2016 macbook pro 15" with touch bar poor battery life

It maybe a hardware issue on the affected machines. I am getting about 7 hrs of use multi-tasking with no heavy use software (no video editing, gaming etc). When fully charges with few apps open (safari, mail, photo, iTunes) I get a calculation of around 11 hrs. See below. That is a fully spec'd 2016 16". Sorry for upside down (not sure why that happened).

To georg2011: Wow, I've never seen more than 3:50 predicted remaining when my 15" new MBP is at 100%. Now sitting at 66% charge with 1:33 remaining. Wish it wasn’t a holiday weekend or I'd be taking it to my nearest Apple store.

I just wanted to chime in that I was compelled to call apple support when my fully charged brand new MacBook Pro 15" reported I had just under 4 hours battery left.

I followed their suggestions by running diagnostics, resetting SMC etc and when I called back started getting messages about the battery monitor is just "guidance".

I am now reduced to physically timing the MacBook's uptime on battery.

What are we supposed to do? I agree, is this normal?

The very first thing to do is try a SMC reset:

Reset the System Management Controller (SMC) on your Mac - Apple Support

@AntS666 Don't get fooled with times being only indications. There's clearly something wrong. I'm waiting to get close to an Apple Store to bring it back.

Did that, it added about an hour...

If you read Walt Mossberg's review, he speaks directly about the poor estimation of time left on battery as well as Apple's response:

http://www.theverge.com/2016/11/14/13618142/walt-mossberg-macbook-pro-fast-slim- tweener

But the real issue here is that Apple claims 10 hours through "light use" whereas actual time/estimated time is closer to 3-6 hours depending on who you speak to (mine: MBP 13" with touch bar is close to 6 hours). This is a huge discrepancy that cannot be ignored.

The issue I have isn't about what type of usage, because I'm looking at the battery life while not using it all, just sitting idle, doing nothing. All initial syncs are done ( Photos etc ), I've reset the smc a few times. Activity indicator shows no major activity. I also dim the screen 12 clicks from bottom just as Apple states in its battery test. I'm not getting 4 hours with a full battery. That's the problem, it's not a issue of appreciation or usage or whatever. It's way off from what it should be, I would love to get Walt's 10 hours but I'm not even teaching 50% of it!

I thought that the estimate was pretty accurate it said 4 hours at full charge and it lasted 4 hours - with nothing running.

Ok I see what you mean. Yes my predictions of around 3 hours are pretty much spot on. The charging prediction are on the contrary completely off. It charges much more rapidly then the prediction. Most probably because the real % left of the battery is wrong. So the system thinks it's flat and gives a fully flat charging prediction. Then the charge starts and the battery ramps up much faster because it was only 30/40% depleted.

Did anyone try contacting apple about this?

Guys

Im going to give some honest advice here. DO NOT! Return your laptops to Apple. This will cause some people hassle and disappointment to find that their replacements machines are also suffering from this problem. I shall back this up with a couple pointers.

Yesterday I was in the Apple Store buying a case for my new MacBook. My card stopped working so I had to phone the bank to get them to sort it, meaning I had lots of time to spend in the store. I tested out 2 machines that were in their by unplugging them. one a 13 inch and one a 15 (both touch bars.)

Both the machines after calculating were giving me 2:45. Both were on %100 percent battery (obviously cause they leave them plugged in) and both were on 50 percent brightness on screen and keyboard. All I did was light web browsing on the Apple Store website on safari with them.

Another point I make is that 2 people I know who have bought 15' models are also experiencing problematic battery readings.

An Apple employee at the store also said that they are aware of the issue and that there will be a software fix for the bad battery readings at some point in the future. Its all to do with poor algorithms and the computer thinking it has no power when there is actually plenty of juice left in them.

So I repeat. DO NOT return your touch bar MacBook's. Wait until a software fix comes for it. Some of you I have read don't have an Apple Store close at all. Im just putting this out there to save you guys a trip! Other than the battery problems. I hope your all enjoying your laptops.

Regards,

C

I think It's reasonable to think it is the case of a software fix. I backup your advice.

I was in the Honolulu store and I decided to replicate your experiment. I unplugged a floor model 15" MBP with touch bar and waited for calculation of estimated battery life. It said 8.5 hours with just Safari open on a fully charged battery.

Next I did the same thing with a 13" MBP with touch bar and, while awaiting for the calculation of battery life left, I looked through the mail app, opened Photos, etc. Nothing heavy. I saw 4.5 hours on a full battery.

Seems like the problem is endemic!

I don't have hard data (yet), but I used by 15" MBP for the past week for fairly light use (normal use is as a SW developer running W7 VM and more). I'm reading this forum because I became alarmed at my impression that I'm not getting anything near like the duration I expected. Earlier today I run from 100% to 10% warning in 3.5 hours--I did have a parallels VM running during that time. But during Thanksgiving week I wasn't seeing very good duration without the VM going. Again, I don't have hard data yet, but I'm pretty convinced its nothing like the 8+ hours for "light use" that has been mentioned by some. More like maybe 6 tops--when doing not much of anything.