Is it better to let lithium batteries stay plugged in or constant 80/20 cycle - eviltoast

I am doing research on best practices for my lithium batteries and lifepo4 powerstation. There’s some conflicting opinions and variation for cycle numbers.

Will leaving my things plugged in at 100% hurt it more than constantly unplugging at 80% and replugging at 20%?

  • Lojcs@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    If it does battery pass through (supplying power directly from the outlet instead of using the battery as a middleman), leaving them plugged in should be fine. If it doesn’t the battery will repeatedly charge and discharge and and depending on the charge level limit that can be very degrading.

    Charging the battery to 100% does do more damage than if you practice 20-80. However doing so limits the battery to 60% of its original capacity. Unless the battery is low quality or over stressed by default, it might take thousands of cycles until the gains from lower degradation outpace the losses.

    I think the comfort factor is the most important tho. If you need to manually keep track of the battery and unplug it once it reaches 80% (and risk forgetting to plug it back once it gets low), just replacing the battery when it degrades might be the better option. If you can control it automatically, doing so would only be beneficial.