Initial site setup

BetterBattery is live at betterbattery.org, and it's more focused than the name suggests. This isn't a general battery resource — it's specifically about MacBook battery management, and specifically about one problem: your MacBook battery is dying while it sits on your desk plugged in.

The core pitch is simple. Keeping a lithium-ion battery at 100% charge accelerates degradation. Apple's own specs confirm it. Research from Battery University, Choi & Lim (2002), and the Dahn Lab at Dalhousie all point to the same conclusion: batteries kept between 20-80% charge last significantly longer. The site cites the specific studies.

The solution uses batt by charlie0129 — an open-source tool that controls MacBook charging behavior. BetterBattery presents two modes: Desk Mode (caps charging at 70% for daily plugged-in use) and Mobile Mode (charges to 100% when you need full capacity for travel). The practical result is roughly 2x battery lifespan, avoiding the $199 Apple battery replacement.

The site includes an interactive environmental impact calculator — plug in how many MacBooks are in your organization and it estimates battery waste prevented. With 80M+ MacBooks in active use globally, the aggregate impact of better charging habits is significant.

There's a setup walkthrough with three paths: using Claude AI to guide installation, manual command-line setup, and a future native Mac app. The science section breaks down the electrochemistry in plain language — why constant full charge causes lithium plating and SEI layer growth, and why the 70% sweet spot works.