How to Extend Chromebook Battery Life

Compared to resource hogging operating systems like Windows or OS X, the Chromebook’s Chrome OS doesn’t need to use a lot power intensive hardware to run.

Disable Bluetooth or Cell Connection

Bluetooth is usually the main culprit for sucking the battery juice out of any of your mobile tech devices. And even though modern Chromebooks ship with Bluetooth “low energy” which has reduced the amount of power required to work, it’s still a drain. If you have an older Chromebook, then you should definitely turn it off when you’re not using it.

The same goes for a cellular connection, if you’re within reach of a Wi-Fi signal. You can turn it off in Settings and click Bluetooth or Cellular section and click the icon to toggle it on or off.

Lower Chromebook Screen Brightness

This trick works with any mobile device, and to turn down the display brightness, you should have a brightness up or down key on the top row of the Chromebook’s keyboard.

Limit Tabs & Background Processes

A lot of power users are used to having 20-100 tabs open at once, and if you do, remember the more that are open, the more battery power you’ll be using. The worst offenders are the sites that are updating in the background. So, if you can, try to limit the amount you have open.

Certain process, especially browser extensions, can take up a lot of juice while they’re running. You might want to turn some of them off if not needed.

To manage what’s running hit the keyboard shortcut Shift+Esc to open the Task Manager, it’s very similar to Windows’ task manger, find what’s taking up a lot of resources, and end the process if you’re not using it.

Browser extensions are like apps — you install one, use it for 10 minutes, then forget about it. So, this is a good time to look over the extensions that are installed, and if you never use one, go in and uninstall it.

For the most part, I’ve found that the battery life of a Chromebook is generally fine without changing any settings. But if you want to eek out every ounce of battery juice possible, consider making some of these changes.