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As long as you have a phone that's reasonably well designed, it's usually not too much trouble to replace the internal battery every 2-3 years. I think our cul

As long as you have a phone that's reasonably well designed, it's usually not too much trouble to replace the internal battery every 2-3 years. I think our culture is really wasteful with batteries. I can't believe that my iphone doesn't have a built-in setting to cap charging at 80%. Studies show that you can decrease battery wear to negligible levels by doing this. Yet my Android e-ink tablet, my iphone, my smartwatch, and my laptop all do not support a hard battery cap. At least I can install al dente on my laptop, and root my tablet. Everything else I just have to manually take off the charger before 80%!

jackmott42 4y ago
I believe the research would suggest 80% doesn't really make an especially good target. Its mostly a linear relationship between state of charge and speed of battery aging, other than a step change around 50-70% depending on the chemistry. source (one of many): https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1149/2.0411609jes/pdf https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1149/2.0411609jes/pdf I keep my EV charged to just 50% most days for this reason, get below that step change.
- gnramires 4y ago
  Interesting, just a note to someone reading that paper: I'm not sure what methodology they used (did they keep the cell SoC in storage?), but storing depleted cells can severely degrade them due to self-discharge (that's why the recommended storage SoC is usually 40%).
detritus 4y ago
I had to bite my tongue seeing a young woman idly hoy one of those extremely wasteful ecigs in the bin on my way home earlier. I wa mentally working all the bits of complexity going to landfill. Still, perhaps I should buy ex-landfill sites on the cheap, so my descendants can mine them.
WanderPanda 4y ago
Al Dente didn‘t really work for me. I used it constantly for 1.5-2 years (capped at 60-80) and my battery still went to 88% of design capacity. My iPhone‘s battery on the other hand has been tortured for three years (always charging 100%, fast charging, getting very hot in the sun) and is still at 85%. I feel like the batteries nowadays are just made to last 2-3 years to get to 85-80% capacity no matter how you treat them
HWR_14 4y ago
> I can't believe that my iphone doesn't have a built-in setting to cap charging at 80% They have a "smart charging" setting which is poorly defined. It says it limits charging to 80% sometimes using AI. I think the idea is it charges to 100% overnight, and 80% the rest of the time. But i agree, it would be nice if it had a selector switch. Some laptops have a "aim for 60%, 80% or 100% battery charge" option.
- ninkendo 4y ago
  The AI tries to predict when you’re going to be leaving it on the charger for a while (like going to bed), and limits the charging to 80% until it predicts you’ll likely need it, then charges it the rest of the way. They do the same thing for Macs, but it’s way, way too conservative IMO. My M1 MBP sits on my desk on a dock with a charger pretty much all week, and it eventually figures out that it should just keep it at 80%. Until a brief period where I use it on battery, draining maybe down to 70%. When I put it back on the dock, it charges back to 100% and stays there for the next 2 days. I would be happy with a “Don’t bother trying to learn, just cap it at 80%, I’ll tell you when I change my mind” setting.
  - HWR_14 4y ago
    Thank you. I too agree that I would prefer to have a manual/scheduled charge setting system.
Ma8ee 4y ago
I just got the batteries replaced in my iPhone X for about $45, and I was without the phone for less than an hour. I am amazed, and very happy not having to shell out $1000 for a new phone that would just have been a marginal upgrade to my current one.
andrepd 4y ago
If you are on Android and have root, you can install ACC (https://f-droid.org/en/packages/mattecarra.accapp/ https://f-droid.org/en/packages/mattecarra.accapp/). It lets you customise the charging profile of your phone as well as see battery statistics, but out of the box it 1. Caps charging to 80% 2. Pauses charging if it gets too hot, until it's below 40°C If you sporadically need full capacity (travelling, etc), just hit the "charge once to 100%" button and you're good to go.
theodric 4y ago
You can get a gizmo called a Chargie that lets your phone control charge rate and max charge% over Bluetooth to this little interposer dongle that sits between the charger and phone. Getting enough to equip all my usual charge points would exceed the cost of a replacement battery, but I guess if they last for more than one phone it's possibly worthwhile.

jackmott42 4y ago

I believe the research would suggest 80% doesn't really make an especially good target. Its mostly a linear relationship between state of charge and speed of battery aging, other than a step change around 50-70% depending on the chemistry. source (one of many): https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1149/2.0411609jes/pdf https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1149/2.0411609jes/pdf I keep my EV charged to just 50% most days for this reason, get below that step change.

gnramires 4y ago
Interesting, just a note to someone reading that paper: I'm not sure what methodology they used (did they keep the cell SoC in storage?), but storing depleted cells can severely degrade them due to self-discharge (that's why the recommended storage SoC is usually 40%).

detritus 4y ago

I had to bite my tongue seeing a young woman idly hoy one of those extremely wasteful ecigs in the bin on my way home earlier. I wa mentally working all the bits of complexity going to landfill. Still, perhaps I should buy ex-landfill sites on the cheap, so my descendants can mine them.

WanderPanda 4y ago

Al Dente didn‘t really work for me. I used it constantly for 1.5-2 years (capped at 60-80) and my battery still went to 88% of design capacity. My iPhone‘s battery on the other hand has been tortured for three years (always charging 100%, fast charging, getting very hot in the sun) and is still at 85%. I feel like the batteries nowadays are just made to last 2-3 years to get to 85-80% capacity no matter how you treat them

HWR_14 4y ago

> I can't believe that my iphone doesn't have a built-in setting to cap charging at 80% They have a "smart charging" setting which is poorly defined. It says it limits charging to 80% sometimes using AI. I think the idea is it charges to 100% overnight, and 80% the rest of the time. But i agree, it would be nice if it had a selector switch. Some laptops have a "aim for 60%, 80% or 100% battery charge" option.

ninkendo 4y ago
The AI tries to predict when you’re going to be leaving it on the charger for a while (like going to bed), and limits the charging to 80% until it predicts you’ll likely need it, then charges it the rest of the way. They do the same thing for Macs, but it’s way, way too conservative IMO. My M1 MBP sits on my desk on a dock with a charger pretty much all week, and it eventually figures out that it should just keep it at 80%. Until a brief period where I use it on battery, draining maybe down to 70%. When I put it back on the dock, it charges back to 100% and stays there for the next 2 days. I would be happy with a “Don’t bother trying to learn, just cap it at 80%, I’ll tell you when I change my mind” setting.
- HWR_14 4y ago
  Thank you. I too agree that I would prefer to have a manual/scheduled charge setting system.

Ma8ee 4y ago

I just got the batteries replaced in my iPhone X for about $45, and I was without the phone for less than an hour. I am amazed, and very happy not having to shell out $1000 for a new phone that would just have been a marginal upgrade to my current one.

andrepd 4y ago

If you are on Android and have root, you can install ACC (https://f-droid.org/en/packages/mattecarra.accapp/ https://f-droid.org/en/packages/mattecarra.accapp/). It lets you customise the charging profile of your phone as well as see battery statistics, but out of the box it 1. Caps charging to 80% 2. Pauses charging if it gets too hot, until it's below 40°C If you sporadically need full capacity (travelling, etc), just hit the "charge once to 100%" button and you're good to go.

theodric 4y ago

You can get a gizmo called a Chargie that lets your phone control charge rate and max charge% over Bluetooth to this little interposer dongle that sits between the charger and phone. Getting enough to equip all my usual charge points would exceed the cost of a replacement battery, but I guess if they last for more than one phone it's possibly worthwhile.