Apps and Significant Energy

In this video, I’m going to show you how you can see which apps are using significant energy on your Mac notebooks, such as your MacBook Air and your MacBook Pro. This way, if we are on our battery, what we’re able to do is we’re able to quit out of those apps and make our battery last longer. Let’s see how we can see which apps are using significant energy on our Mac book pro or MacBook air. Let’s go to my Mac.

Now the way that we do this is through our menu extras. If you’re not familiar with menu extras, these are little extra menus located on the right side of our menu bar, and they give us different pieces of information, depending on which menu extra it is.

For example, if I go over to my wifi here, I can see all the different available networks and connect them up to them. I can go over to the clock here. And see the date and time, or even change it to an analog clock to see which apps are using significant energy. What we need to do is we need to add our battery menu extra.

So how do we do that? Well, what we need to do is we need to go to our System Preferences. So I’m going to go up underneath the Apple menu here. And then go to System Preferences from here. What we need to do is we need to go to energy saver, under energy saver. You’re going to see show battery status in the menu bar.

This is going to add that menu extra. Once we add that menu extra for the battery, we can see which apps are using significant. So now I select this, and you’re going to see up at the top here. I have a new menu, extra my battery. Now, when I click on this, let’s go and close my System Preferences here.

Now, when I click on this one, I can see or which apps are using. Significant energy. Now, if you do not have any apps that are using significant energy, you will not see anything here. This only shows when apps use and significant energy, then what it does is, it lists all the apps that are using significant energy.

So we can see that I have ScreenFlow, which is what I record with. So that’s using significant energy. And then, I also have Pixelmator Pro open, which is like Photoshop. That app also is using significant energy. So now what I would want to do, if I was using my Mac book pros battery, what I would want to do is I would want to quit out of these apps that I am no longer using, thereby prolonging the life of my battery as I’m using my computer.

So what I would do is I would go down to Pixelmator Pro here. If I click and hold, you’re going to see quit. I would just quit this app. And now, when we go back up to our menu extra, you’re going to see I no longer have pixel made a pro listed here. So that’s how we can see which apps are using significant energy on our Mac notebooks, such as a MacBook Air or a MacBook Pro.

What you need to do is you need to add the battery menu bar extra. You do this through the system preferences under energy saver. Once you do that, You click on the battery and your menu bar, and you’ll be able to see which apps are using significant energy from there. I would quit any of those apps that you are no longer using.

So that’s how you can see which apps you use and significant energy on your Mac notebooks, such as a MacBook Air or a MacBook Pro.