Checking the battery health on Windows 11

Here are the steps to check the battery health on Windows 11 to confirm whether you need a battery replacement.

On laptops and tablets, battery life is essential since it'll determine how long you would be running Windows 11 along with your applications. As a result, understanding the health of the battery can be helpful to find out any energy problems or whether the battery needs replacement.

Whatever the reason might be, Windows 11 includes a command-line tool that analyzes the usage over time to generate a battery health report to review the battery specifications, energy usage, estimated battery life, and details to determine whether the device needs a battery replacement.

In this Windows 11 guide, we will walk you through the steps to create and understand the battery health report of your laptop or tablet.

How to check battery health on Windows 11

To create a report of the battery health on Windows 11, use these steps:

1. Open Start.
2. Search for Command Prompt, right-click the top result, and select the Run as administrator option.

3. Type the following command to create a battery report on Windows 11 and press Enter:

   powercfg /batteryreport /output "C:\battery_report.html"

Once you complete the steps, the report will be saved automatically in the main installation drive.

Reading battery report

1. Open File Explorer.
2. Click on This PC from the left pane.
3. Under the "Devices and drives" section, double-click the "C" drive.

4. Double-click to open the "battery_report.html" file with the default web browser.

The report is made up of several sections with self-explanatory information. The section with the most information you want is perhaps the "Installed Batteries" section that gives you a general overview of the battery installed on your computer, including name, manufacturer, serial number, chemistry, design capacity, and cycle count.

If you want to know whether the battery needs replacement, you need to look at the "design capacity" and "full charge capacity." In the example, you can see that the battery was designed to hold 44,156mWh, and the full charge capacity is 44,156mWh, indicating that the battery can still hold 100% of the charge. However, if the full charge capacity drops significantly (around less than 50%), it could indicate that it's time to replace the battery.

The "Recent Usage" section shows when the computer was active, suspended, or in connected standby. This information may come in handy to determine whether the device is waking up automatically at random times when it should not.

The "Battery usage" section shows a graph with valuable information about the battery drain over the last three days.

The "Usage history" tracks how long the computer was using battery power and when it was plugged into an electrical outlet.

The "Battery capacity history" tracks the charge capacity history of the battery.

Finally, the "Battery life estimates" section shows the battery life based on observed drains. In other words, this section shows a prediction of the battery life for common usage.

The tool works best as it collects more data over time. This means that if you generate a battery report on a new device or new installation, you are not likely to find many useful details. If you encounter problems with the battery, it's recommended to go through several cycles to find patterns that could help determine the problem.

More Windows resources

For more helpful articles, coverage, and answers to common questions about Windows 10 and Windows 11, visit the following resources:

• Windows 11 on Windows Central — All you need to know
• Windows 11 help, tips, and tricks
• Windows 10 on Windows Central — All you need to know