Mid-2012 MacBook Pro Battery Health

Hold the option key and click on the battery icon. It will tell you the condition status.

If you need longer battery life, then replace it.

I have the same MBP mid-2012. I put a NEW battery in it as my battery cycle count reached 1600.

My advice to you is there are allot if battery manufacture out there on ebay and amazon selling batteries for cheap.

Dont buy these as some batties do not work properly and may cause your macbook to over heat and damage your computer.

Buy from www.owc.com or apple.

A good battery should last your up to 5 years or more.

alex7375 wrote:

Buy from www.owc.com or apple.

A good battery should last your up to 5 years or more.

I would trust what Powerbook Medic or iFixit sells. However, they (along with OWC) are on the high end of prices for aftermarket.

I don't know exactly what to do with mine. I've got under 100 cycles in 3 years as I mostly use it as a "desktop replacement". When I got it the battery was already registering at 94% health. It was about 9 months old when I got it, so perhaps the battery had degraded in storage. Right now it's registering about 86% health, so I don't believe Apple will do a replacement service yet.

However, the mid-2012 MBP does benefit from being the last of the Unibody models that was made until 2016. So there's still time left before they're supposed to cut off supplies of spare parts like batteries. And I'm in California where they will give another two years where I can go to an AASP for an OEM battery.

Apple has never made batteries. They buy from companies like Simplo, which is the largest maker of computer batteries in the world. There's probably a second source. You might see "DP" with an OEM Apple battery, although I'm not sure what's the full name of the company.

Apple doesn't guarantee the whole 80% battery health under 1000 cycles unless it's still under warranty or AppleCare. Obviously very few people are going to be approaching that within the warranty period, although it would cover premature reduction in capacity. In the past Apple considered a battery that was identified as "service now" or under 80% with less than the specified number of charge cycles, they might offer a reduced price "service replacement" battery. I had a battery that swelled well under the published 300 cycles, and Apple sold me a service replacement battery for $99, compared to the $129 retail battery. I also had to exchange it and couldn't keep the (plain cardboard) box. I could have bought the retail battery from Amazon and kept my old battery. However, this was for a battery that was designed for the user to replace.

Out-A-Fit_Bear wrote:

I already know that my battery says service battery. What I’m looking to know is when I should change it if my battery health is around 60%.

It is not rocket science. You got the money, buy a new one.