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I have a new 2018 MBP with an i9. I've noticed I can squeeze upwards of six hours battery out of it using Safari. With Firefox I'm lucky to get three. I made

by bmurphy1976 8y ago

I have a new 2018 MBP with an i9. I've noticed I can squeeze upwards of six hours battery out of it using Safari. With Firefox I'm lucky to get three. I made this change just to see. So far it does appear to have lowered the energy impact score a bit, but I'm not sure it's enough to matter yet. I guess we'll know in a couple hours. Edit: 20 minutes in and I've watched my Time Remaining estimate creep up from 3 hours to 5.5 hours. Seems like a solid win so far (other than it looks like crap).

greggarious 8y ago
I use Firefox. I've found the big battery hit has come from streaming services (Netflix, Pandora, Spotify, Youtube, etc). One small change I made was streaming music to my phone, and that had a big impact. I know that streaming will use some battery life, but the amount of CPU being used by say, Pandora, was rather extreme.
- bmurphy1976 8y ago
  Sure, those will kill battery usage, but that's not what I'm doing. Typically I'm bouncing between the browser with about 10 informational tabs open, terminal, and sublime text all day long. There's a night and day difference using Safari vs Firefox for just regular browsing. I'm not the only one who experiences this either, I have a coworker who complains about the same issue with his couple year old MBP. Firefox is a battery vampire.
  - nextos 8y ago
    It'd be interesting to monitor Firefox vs Safari using e.g. powertop. Using Linux, I get excellent battery life using Firefox. But it might be the case that safari is still much better, or that it behaves differently on macOS.
    - pcwalton 8y ago
      Note that the GL context opacity issue is entirely macOS-specific and does not affect Linux.
- pull_my_finger 8y ago
  I wonder if it's DRM related?
nathancahill 8y ago
Yes, unfortunately true. I'm a Firefox user, as loyal as they come, but put me on a long flight without the ability to charge, and you bet I'll be using Safari the whole time. The battery life is amazing.
satysin 8y ago
2018 MBP with i9 here as well. I am getting 10-11 hours battery life with Chrome. What exactly are you doing on your machine other than browsing as it isn't the browser causing such low battery life. Even when working in Xcode and IntelliJ I still easily get 7-8 hours.
- simongr3dal 8y ago
  Screen brightness makes a big difference.
- bmurphy1976 8y ago
  Compilation, screen brightness, docker, and slack are another significant chunk.
bmurphy1976 8y ago
For anybody reading this after-the-fact, I was able to squeeze just shy of 6 hours out of my laptop with this change.

greggarious 8y ago

I use Firefox. I've found the big battery hit has come from streaming services (Netflix, Pandora, Spotify, Youtube, etc). One small change I made was streaming music to my phone, and that had a big impact. I know that streaming will use some battery life, but the amount of CPU being used by say, Pandora, was rather extreme.

bmurphy1976 8y ago
Sure, those will kill battery usage, but that's not what I'm doing. Typically I'm bouncing between the browser with about 10 informational tabs open, terminal, and sublime text all day long. There's a night and day difference using Safari vs Firefox for just regular browsing. I'm not the only one who experiences this either, I have a coworker who complains about the same issue with his couple year old MBP. Firefox is a battery vampire.
- nextos 8y ago
  It'd be interesting to monitor Firefox vs Safari using e.g. powertop. Using Linux, I get excellent battery life using Firefox. But it might be the case that safari is still much better, or that it behaves differently on macOS.
  - pcwalton 8y ago
    Note that the GL context opacity issue is entirely macOS-specific and does not affect Linux.
pull_my_finger 8y ago
I wonder if it's DRM related?

nathancahill 8y ago

Yes, unfortunately true. I'm a Firefox user, as loyal as they come, but put me on a long flight without the ability to charge, and you bet I'll be using Safari the whole time. The battery life is amazing.

satysin 8y ago

2018 MBP with i9 here as well. I am getting 10-11 hours battery life with Chrome. What exactly are you doing on your machine other than browsing as it isn't the browser causing such low battery life. Even when working in Xcode and IntelliJ I still easily get 7-8 hours.

simongr3dal 8y ago
Screen brightness makes a big difference.
bmurphy1976 8y ago
Compilation, screen brightness, docker, and slack are another significant chunk.

bmurphy1976 8y ago

For anybody reading this after-the-fact, I was able to squeeze just shy of 6 hours out of my laptop with this change.