Macworld’s 13″ MacBook Pro Review: The 10-Hour Battery Lasts Four Hours

Giles Turnbull ()

20100422-batterylife.jpg

Jonathan Seff at Macworld has posted a detailed review of the new 13” MacBook Pro, which has one interesting finding: the computer’s battery life doesn’t quite live up to Apple’s claims of 10 hours.

Seff writes:

“Our standard battery test, which plays a looped video in QuickTime until the battery dies, showed a life of 4 hours and 19 minutes for the 2.4GHz model and 4 hours and 33 minutes for the 2.66GHz model.”

In other words, better than the previous 13” model. But still a long way from the 10 hours claimed by Apple.

Now, I know that the claims computer companies make for notebook batteries need to taken with more than a pinch (more like a truckload) of salt. And it’s true, they’ve covered themselves with those magic words “up to” – but alongside images like this one.

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But, given the battery life of the iPad – in many cases exceeding Apple’s claims – it seemed fair to take the 10-hour claim at face value. After all, the clever battery technology that works in one device could be reasonably expected to work in another. The Macworld review suggests we should think otherwise.

Ever since they were announced, I’ve been on the verge of buying one of these machines, solely for the combination of portability and battery life. Now I’m not so sure.

53 comments »

About the author

gilest

Giles Turnbull is a freelance writer in England. He writes for the Press Association and The Morning News. He has a website you can ignore and a Twitter account you needn't follow.

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Posted in MacBook Pro, News |

  • http://www.flavors.me/paddyduke Paddy Duke

    Apple do include this disclaimer on their MacBook Pro site:

    “Battery life depends on configuration and use. See http://www.apple.com/batteries for more information. The wireless productivity test measures battery life by wirelessly browsing various websites and editing text in a word processing document with display brightness set to 50%.”

  • http://www.applenext.com enostrum

    It’s 10 hours of wireless productivity, make a word document with wifi enabled…

    NOT PLAYING A VIDEO!

    If you play a video in a 3h battery announced notebook, it will last 1h

  • Mike McGregor

    That’s a pretty un-fair test. Apple will base their battery life figures on a range of different tasks that the computer can handle, the majority of which will be typing in a word processor, with airport disabled, screen brightness reduced to minimum levels, keyboard backlight off.. i.e. optimal conditions. exactly the same way as every other manufacturer will test their battery life.

    Really what you need to do is a range of different tasks that an average user would do, then work out the average.

  • miguel

    They stated in the little letters underneath the battery life that it longs 10 hours in a typing processing task. Meaning just typing in microsoft word or pages or anything else, the battery will last 10 hours.

    Is different in the iPad because they said “It longs 10 hours watching videos.”

  • TRRosen

    Thats like saying Apple claimed an iPod could hold 5000 songs but in tests it could only hold 324 copies of Alice’s restaurant in lossless format.

  • TRRosen

    Apple claims 10 hours browsing via wireless and typing with the screen at 50% (which on these newer machines is brighter than whats comfortable for most)

  • http://luke-sha.net luke

    i’m always dubious of these tests. when i first got my 13″ MBP, i was skeptical of the claims, but the battery life was absolutely killer amazing. i hardly take MacWorld’s test as a standard bearer for true usage. if i ran Final Cut Pro, not plugged into a wall, i’m certain my battery would be zilch in about two hours. but i don’t, because i know better and i think most people know better.

  • Tom

    Is the 330 kicking in full power for those hours? Might be the GPU burning the battery life.

    “Our standard battery test, which plays a looped video in QuickTime until the battery dies, showed a life of 4 hours and 19 minutes for the 2.4GHz model and 4 hours and 33 minutes for the 2.66GHz model. Those compare favorably to the 2009 13-inch 2.26GHz (3 hours and 30 minutes) and 2.53GHz (3 hours and 38 minutes) models, as well as the current MacBook () model (3 hours and 45 minutes). In simple terms, the batteries do indeed last longer. (Apple uses a different methodology for battery testing, wirelessly browsing Websites and editing text in a word processing document with display brightness set to 50 percent.)”

  • charli

    Macworld needs to learn to read. They say “up to” 10 hours. And they acknowledge that video is one of the biggest battery eaters.

    So none of this is the smoking gun they claim it to be.

  • http://www.metrokids.ca Conrad

    I have a Mid-2009 13″ MBP 2.53GHz. And I typically get a little over 5 hours wireless. That’s some web browsing, iTunes, Screen at full brightness (use in daylight settings) and typically some productivity software open (Pages/Numbers/Keynote). Considering they advertise 7hrs for my model I think real-world usage is pretty stinkin’ good. I can’t imagine it got worse.

  • firesign3000

    What a stupid test. Nobody would reasonably expect the battery in any laptop to last ten hours while constantly playing videos. This kind of thing makes me wonder why I even bother reading tech blogs anymore. They’re more and more whining how a product sucks because it doesn’t meet some unreasonable expectations, usually after being tested by people who appear to be less than qualified to do so.

  • Paul

    For a minute I thought I was reading Gizmodo. Misleading title and a bit of BS.

    Please don’t turn into a Gizmodo clone.

  • Gary

    In other news today, Toyota’s claims of 50mpg for the 2010 Prius were said to be debunked after AutoBlog tested it flat-out at the Nardo ring carrying a fully-loaded roof-rack and trailer. The review team were only able to achieve a trifling 30mpg and recommends that consumers should immediately boycott the Prius for such shocking fuel economy.

  • g24

    Ok, so video playback shouldn’t be such a battery drain, but really this is a poor article, shameful. Not worth adding any more to what others have already said.

  • CharleiBing

    Here’s what Computer Shopper says (and I quote… ahem…):

    Battery life is where the MacBook continues to wipe its competition off the board. We ran our highly demanding DVD rundown test, in which we loop a movie until the battery dies. The battery lasted 7 hours and 28 minutes.

    So you guys loop a QT movie, and these guys loop a DVD. Whatever… the full review is here:

    http://computershopper.com/laptops/reviews/apple-macbook-pro-13-inch-2010-version

    I don’t know… but then I have a 5+ year old PowerBook G4, and the battery lasts about 30 seconds, so 4.25 hrs, 7.5 hrs. what the heck, I’ve already ordered a new 13″… can hardly wait.

  • Chase

    Giles Turnbull,

    Why are you even writing articles? You’re an idiot. If you read the original article from MacWorld, they don’t disagree with the “up to 10-hour” battery life. They did a completely different battery test. They clearly say that Apple runs their own battery test which is “wirelessly browsing Websites and editing text in a word processing document with display brightness set to 50 percent.”

    THAT’s where you get 10 hours. Apple never claimed to get 10-hours of battery life with a quicktime video playing. This kinda makes me want to stop reading CoM for the retarded shit like this.

  • http://www.joshuazimmerman.com/blog/ Joshua Zimmerman

    I was doing basic browsing and typing stuff on my brand spanking new MBP 15in i7, and got 5.5 hours. That was with my brightness well over 50% and doing a bit of downloading as well.

  • http://www.cultofmac.com Leigh McMullen

    @Everyone: Give giles a break, he’s just reporting the results of someone else’s test.

    @Giles: To amplify your article, can you see if they calibrated the battery first? the new Macbook Pros need to have their battery calibrated FIRST before you get optimum battery life. (see: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1490)

    In my test of the new 17: i7 it lasted but 4 hours uncalibrated, now it’s lasting a workday.

  • media_lush

    what a dumbass comparison

    kinda of like a car reviewer testing the mpg stats of a car by driving it at maximum speed in first gear – and he works for Macworld?

    I think the editor should give Mr Seff a lesson into how to write for a magazine.

  • FAILTAGE

    /facepalm and i agree with everyone else, this post is garbage.

  • TRRosen

    What do you expect he’s British. He comes from the same school of tabloid journalism as Gawker’s owner. He was taught that if the stories dull just make the title imply something more salacious than it is.

    OK I’m picking on Giles a bit. To be fair if this was Gizmodo he would be demoting all these comments and adding his own so I guess the London tabloids haven’t totally fried his integrity. He sensationalized a bit and now he’s taking his lumps so maybe the system works at CofM.

  • imajoebob

    Better than I got. I plugged in 17 USB-powered hard drives (would have done more but ran out of hubs), daisy-chained 7 iPods in Firewire, jammed a Blu Ray disc into the slot drive and taped it over so it continually ejected and reloaded, turned on the camera, cranked up the volume, and recorded my pug dancing to Right Said Fred’s “I’m Too Sexy” (I’ll post the YouTube address as soon as I’m done editing), while downloading all 35 episodes of “Fish.”

    I barely got 2 1/2 hours.

    That’s “normal” use, isn’t it?

  • http://none Himanshu

    ["Ever since they were announced, I’ve been on the verge of buying one of these machines, solely for the combination of portability and battery life. Now I’m not so sure."] – Do you know of a machine which gives you better battery life but also has the same features as a MBP? Let me know and we all will switch.

  • Jon

    Wow. What a lame test. Not that looping a QT video counts as normal use anyway, but depending on the codec used you’ll get drastically different results. Play some of the DVDs I’ve ripped to h.264, high res, 2-pass encoding and you’ll probably get even less. Retarded.

  • Bert

    It’s not Macworld’s Test that’s the problem. Its the author of this ridiculous post! This is what’s written AFTER the paragraph on 4hour battery life.

    “Those compare favorably to the 2009 13-inch 2.26GHz (3 hours and 30 minutes) and 2.53GHz (3 hours and 38 minutes) models, as well as the current MacBook () model (3 hours and 45 minutes). In simple terms, the batteries do indeed last longer. (Apple uses a different methodology for battery testing, wirelessly browsing Websites and editing text in a word processing document with display brightness set to 50 percent.)”

    Some of the articles on this site are gems, some of them are absolute rubbish. This is the latter. The battery for the new 13″ lasts a whole hour longer than the previous generation. Sensationalizing A Headline. Ridiculous.

  • Jonathan Hawken

    The idea that a battery needs to be calibrated is one of the funniest things I’ve ever heard for two reasons. First, no one is going to do it. And second, the FCC of a battery will not increase, it will decrease.

    Battery run times are far too subjective, however they are impressively good on the new laptops.

  • Greg

    Streamed the Sens vs Pittsburg game into the 3rd OT while using XCode during the breaks. Still had 1/2 hour of battery left. This is on the previous MBP 13.

    The laptop always outlasts me and it’s recharge time is amazing too.

    Ya it wont last 7 hours, but 4-5 hours of heavy duty use is incredible compared to the laptops we had only a couple of years ago that would have a hardtime streaming video for 45-60 minutes.

  • Becca

    The new batteries suck! It lasts if you don’t use it and leave the screen saver on the whole time. But I use my laptop all day and part of the night and I have to stay plugged in or it dies in about three hours and I’m doing graphic and web design. I expected more from apple the worse part is i can’t even have a back up battery because you can’t change the battery anymore. :(

  • Jonathan Seff

    Sigh. We have a standard test that we use to test laptop battery life. It’s not the same as Apple’s, but we use the same test on every system, which gives a point of comparison.

    Nowhere did I say that Apple’s numbers were a lie or imply our review was a gotcha. In fact, as some of the comments here point out (and thank you to those people), I give those other numbers to show that the battery life on the new 13-inch MacBook Pro is indeed better than the previous generation. And if that weren’t clear enough, I then wrote “In simple terms, the batteries do indeed last longer.” And then for additional clarification, I went back and added a sentence about Apple’s tests and a link to the company’s MacBook Pro battery page.

    It’s sad that people try to read something into a story that simply isn’t there. Read the whole review instead of misreading one graph out and you’ll see what I actually think about the new models.

  • http://gilest.org giles

    Dear all

    apologies; this was an ill-considered post with a bad headline. I wasn’t trying to sensationalise, but I wasn’t making much sense either.

    Apologies to Jon Seff too.

    G

  • Mezzrow

    Agreed, that 10-hr battery life has to be put in context–it’s most likely claimed for “average overall use”, not “full-out graphics rendering” for 10 hours. I don’t take from this that Apple is being deceptive.

    In the case of the iPad, Steve did make a claim–it was tested and found to be accurate. I’ve verified that one myself.

  • Erving

    Crappy way to test. Not even relevant.

  • andy

    The test from Macworld makes sense..

    To me, its another barometer as to measure how improved the battery in the 2010 model compared to the 2009 model. Clearly it shows improvement in such a high stress test and I know that Apples claims of increased battery life are true.

  • Dec

    10hrs…..? Well why would I need a batter that would last that long? Maybe (and I’m going out on a limb here), I could use it to study and aid research for my exams while sitting in the library when all the “outlets” (as you yanks call ‘em) are taken? The fact I don’t have to show up at the crack of 8.30 to get one of these seats means I can channel my energies to more useful things, like how many adderall I should take..?
    Seriously though, I’ve been using mine to view wikipedia, class notes, .pdfs and other non intensive tasks.

    If I’m gonna watch a movie I’ll sure as hell have my charger to hand, and if I’m on a plane, I’ll read a book because my brain doesn’t need to be attacked by visual media 24/7, taht or use my iPhone…whatever works

  • Liam

    Ok. Seriously, my reviewing friend, if this sounds redundant it is only because every person commenting on your ‘review’ has said the same thing. 10 hours does NOT mean 10 hours of playing a video. 10 hours is meant to be the amount of time a person can work while working on “nomal” tasks, such as word-processing and email. It is time for you to take a hint from EVERYONE and learn how to review a computer.

  • Hipster

    It was an unfortunate post, but that doesn’t justify the total lack of courtesy from many of the commenters, and Mr. Seth too. Whatever happened to respectability? Courtesy? If you’re a regular reader you know that this was clearly an oversight.

  • Hanoch

    I have been using the new Macbook Pro 13 inch exactly as described by Apple (i.e., word processing, web browsing, at 50% (or less) brightness) and I have never gotten anywhere near 10 hours. About 7 hours max–30% lower than Apple’s claim.

  • Erinos

    your battery can last up to 10 hour only if you let it be in sleep mode or standby mode….I guess this is what Apple mean. working with it ..naa…its wont last.

  • Luis Carlos (Portugal)

    “It’s 10 hours of wireless productivity, make a word document with wifi enabled…

    NOT PLAYING A VIDEO!”

    enostrum… my new MacBook Pro works for 5 hours with word, wi-fi and some browsing…

  • Andrew

    My 2010 13″ 2.4 MBP normally gets 5 hours on wifi, down to 3.30-4 with other more demanding activities. That translates to about 7 hours with dimmed screen and wifi off. Still pretty good.

  • That Guy

    Who needs 7 hours? Who needs 5 hours? Who even needs 3 hours? Sure, you could watch a movie at the airport or something, but do you think that laptops are supposed to be your only or major source of entertainment on the go? Seriously, why not just shell out another 200 bucks and buy an ipod? They last just as long for video, or get the oversized ipod touch: the iPad! I seriously don’t think that you need to be watching blockbusters at the mall on your laptop.

  • Billabong

    I would just like to say that gary’s comment on april 22nd was hilarious

  • Matt Price

    got my macbook pro 13inch a few days ago and i love it. on it right now!!!

  • jakob plum philipsen

    hi..
    i get quiet mad when i read this article, because its not true what you are saying! .. apple doesn´t says it longs for 10 hours of video, but 10 hours of surfing!!

    please know your stuff before writing an article like this…

  • Mmcverry

    I had close to 10-hour battery life when my MBP was new, however as I loaded up the hard drive and increases the number of running processes, I noticed a severe drain. Now I average around 5 hours with iStat showing battery health of 84% on 190 cycles. The computer is less than 10 months old! I can’t complain too much though, it’s still far superior than most notebooks out there.

  • http://increasingworkplaceproductivity.net Bojan Djordjevic

    Yep I agree. I am weired out by how much battery counter displays and how it spikes numbers up and down. I’d say it lasts around 4-6 hours depending on the usage.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_63V47IOPTJFD7V4ENCQDRMNMWQ ScottZ

    I have had my 2010 15″ mac book pro last 11 hours before.  I can watch 4hrs of HD Video on a single charge.

  • Anonymous

    i am forced to use a macbook pro at my job. it is hands down, without a doubt, no question the WORST ‘computer’ i have ever used. it is slow, hangs up and requires multiple restarts, and every app on it is horrible to use. i have a 7 yr old pc at home that is faster, more robust and reliable than this piece of sh*t. 

    DON”T EVER BUY A MAC

    • Titian

      Really?! JACKMEOFF001………..REALLY?! NO really??!

    • Titian

      Really?! JACKMEOFF001………..REALLY?! NO really??!

    • Chris Rose

      Hey, Kid,

      You’re an ID&*T!

      And a TROLL! 

  • James

    Thats expected –’  Obviously surfing web or reading pdfs doesnt “waste” same battery as playing videos…………. If you use it for surfing web and light applications with less then half brightness ( I always use 30-40% brightness) it will lasts like 10h as announced or even more !! And thats more that almost any laptop.

  • Joel

    I have a mid 2009 mb pro 13″ and at first I consistently got 6 hrs during normal use, which involved web browsing and reading documents (this was released before the 10hr version, and only claimed 7hrs). However that time went down significantly when more processor intensive applications were running such as running MATLAB simulations and editing video. This is to be expected. My Dell laptop from the same year with about the same specs never got more than 3 hrs and it is a lot more bulky. Now that it has been 2 years the Dell doesn’t even get an hour and my mb pro still gets more than 4 when fully charged, however my mb pro does have a service battery indicator, which means that school has taken its toll and it’s probably time to replace or service the battery.