Energy efficiency is a crucial aspect of modern computing, especially for users who rely on portable devices like MacBooks. Optimizing energy consumption can extend battery life, reduce electricity costs, and contribute to environmental sustainability. This article will guide you through various methods to optimize energy consumption on macOS, ensuring your Apple devices run efficiently without compromising performance.

Examples:

1. Adjusting Energy Saver Settings:

   • Open "System Preferences" and navigate to "Energy Saver."
   • Adjust the "Turn display off after" slider to a shorter duration.
   • Enable "Put hard disks to sleep when possible."
   • Enable "Slightly dim the display while on battery power."

   # Command to adjust display sleep settings via Terminal
   sudo pmset displaysleep 5

2. Managing Background Processes:

   • Use the "Activity Monitor" to identify and quit unnecessary background processes that consume energy.
   • Navigate to "Applications" > "Utilities" > "Activity Monitor."
   • Sort processes by "Energy Impact" and quit high-energy-consuming processes that are not needed.

   # Command to list all running processes and their energy impact
   pmset -g pslog

3. Optimizing Battery Health:

   • Enable "Battery Health Management" in "System Preferences" > "Battery" > "Battery Health."
   • This feature helps reduce battery aging by learning your charging routine and reducing the time your Mac spends fully charged.

   # Command to check battery health status
   system_profiler SPPowerDataType | grep "Cycle Count"

4. Using Dark Mode:

   • Enabling Dark Mode can save energy, especially on OLED screens, by reducing the amount of light emitted.
   • Go to "System Preferences" > "General" and select "Dark" under the "Appearance" section.

   # Command to enable Dark Mode via Terminal
   osascript -e 'tell application "System Events" to tell appearance preferences to set dark mode to true'

5. Disabling Unnecessary Visual Effects:

   • Disabling visual effects can reduce GPU load and save energy.
   • Go to "System Preferences" > "Accessibility" > "Display" and check "Reduce motion" and "Reduce transparency."

   # Command to reduce transparency via Terminal
   defaults write com.apple.universalaccess reduceTransparency -bool true