PT: Rewritten after Apple's event, to reflect that Apple actually managed to reduce the size of the battery. (In an earlier version of this article, that's exactly what I predicted wouldn't happen, and I'll be glad to be proven wrong.) This way, the company has a bit more headroom to improve battery life over the next few years, without hitting that 100 watt-hour wall.Ĭheck out all of today's Apple news here. If Apple had opted to stick with a 99.5Wh battery instead of shrinking down the computer, perhaps we'd be looking at 12 hours on a charge. Lithium-ion batteries are considered hazardous materials, because of their ability to explode, and so generally you can only carry one internal up-to-100Wh battery and a couple of up-to-160Wh removable spares on a flight now.

I'm not sure why 100 watt-hours is the limit, and not 99 or 103, but it's been the rule in many countries ( including the US) for a number of years. It's illegal to carry a laptop on an airplane with a battery capacity greater than 100 watt-hours - and last year's 15-inch MacBook Pro already had a 99.5 watt-hour power pack. But I'm not talking about science - I'm talking about the law. I know that's a bold claim, and Apple's engineers have done seemingly impossible things before. But you know what? Even if Apple wanted to make the battery bigger, the company couldn't do it. Part of that's because the new MacBook Pro is thinner, and has a smaller battery pack inside.

But last year, the MacBook Pro got 9 to 10 hours. That's not just respectable - it's good, particularly for a laptop with a quad-core CPU. And sometimes, you can get it - but if you were expecting many hours of additional battery life from a new 15-inch MacBook Pro, you'll be disappointed.Īpple quotes a 10 hour battery life for the new MacBook Pro, whether you pick the 13- or 15-inch model.

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