If you bought a new replacement laptop battery as a precaution, will it go bad if you let it sit around unused until some future date when it might be needed? Today’s SuperUser Q&A post offers advice in response to a curious reader’s question.
Today’s Question & Answer session comes to us courtesy of SuperUser—a subdivision of Stack Exchange, a community-driven grouping of Q&A web sites.
Photo courtesy of Quentin Meulepas (Flickr).
The Question
SuperUser reader ‘Dude named Ben’ wants to know if a new unused laptop battery will go bad if left sitting around:
Will letting the new battery sit around unused cause it to go bad or should Ben swap the two batteries out every so often?
After I received the new power adapter I discovered that the old adapter was indeed the problem, so I continued to use the original battery.
My question is, can I leave the new Lithium-Ion generic battery I bought in its sealed packaging until I need it? Will it degrade if left unused or should I swap them out once a week to keep the new one alive?
The Answer
SuperUser contributor Jamie Hanrahan has the answer for us:
Have something to add to the explanation? Sound off in the comments. Want to read more answers from other tech-savvy Stack Exchange users? Check out the full discussion thread here.
It probably came to you with a charge in the 40-60 percent range since that is the most stable charge level for storage.
If you are not going to use it, I would check it every month or so. If it drops below 20 percent, then charge it to bring it back up to around 60 percent or so before storing it again.
If it were me, I would switch to the new battery and keep the old one as a “just in case” spare. The new one should give your laptop a much longer running time.
