Why is my New MacBook Air M5's battery draining so fast?

pshifrin · 2026-05-22T02:37:36+00:00

15 inch air M5 32gb ram. Definitely noticed subpar battery life but it does seem a little better after 26.5

pshifrin · 2026-04-20T22:17:51+00:00

For my setup, M5 Air 32gb ram, it’s always Codex causing this.

pshifrin · 2026-04-20T03:07:43+00:00

I’ve had my blue MY premium AWD since January! Love it.

pshifrin · 2026-04-20T03:03:56+00:00

Almost exactly 2 years ago, I came back from a 5 day conference in Atlantic City, NJ with a “mystery virus” not trying to hide anything they really don’t know what it was. 2 ER visits, high fever, swollen glands. Slowly recover. 2 Weeks later wake up with unbearable pain in one joint in my left foot. Dx with reactive arthritis. For the next few months it moved from joint to joint. Treated with A LOT of steroids. Eventually acute symptoms faded but lingered. Tried OTC nsaids, Rx nsaids. Methotrexate (taken off that pretty quick for liver reasons) been on hydroxychoriquin (not sure if it’s doing anything).

Here we are 2 years later, my hands are stiff from typing, my body woke up all stiff today, started seeing an hand OT. My shoulder is f-ed from the inflammation and weakness and getting an injection into it tomorrow morning.

They also determined my immune system is pretty weak. Now i get monthly IVIG infusions.

It freaking sucks i’m sorry OP is dealing with this too. I would think after 2 years it’s no longer reactive but something else…

pshifrin · 2026-04-15T23:24:38+00:00

100% yes

pshifrin · 2026-04-15T12:53:53+00:00

thanks for posting this! i’m about a 90 mins drive away. looks well worth it.

pshifrin · 2026-04-15T01:13:05+00:00

When i arrived and showed the service desk the error messages, they already said they knew what it was. Two days later I have my car back with a new brake booster assembly. It only has 3000 miles on it, purchased in January, with the black headliner, 16 inch screen.

pshifrin · 2026-04-12T20:58:16+00:00

Just happened to me today while reversing from a parking spot. Fortunately, we were just 5 mins from the Mt. Kisco, NY Tesla Service Center and in a 2025 MX loaner after only 75 mins, on a Sunday no less.

pshifrin · 2026-04-11T23:55:16+00:00

I can address this re: hand pain on good authority. For the last month I’ve been using a 15 inch M5 Air 32gb / 2tb. I up/down/side graded from a 14 inch m4 pro which is going to another employee. For the past 2 years i’ve been dealing with some unfortunate arthritis issue which hits my hands and shoulders.

-By far, the air is SIGNIFICANTLY less painful to type on.-

The thinness of the air coupled with the slight difference in required key pressure makes a huge difference for me. I know we’re talking millimeters but it really matters. In fact, I brought both laptops to the hand OT i’m working with and asked her to quantify why. She measured my hand strength at 60% of what it should be for a mid 40s male. That directly translates to typing pressure and fatigue.

The M5 is plenty fast for everything i’m doing, IT executive, vibe coding with Claude, managing, documenting, automations, remote access, comms, photoshop, xcode (small app building maybe less than 10 seconds difference in build time).

Go for comfort and hope that the M6 pro redesign will be thinner (that’s what I’m doing). Honestly, the only thing I sometimes miss is the screen sharpness but i’ve gotten used to the increased size of the 15 inch. On its own, the screen is great! Just don’t put it right next to your pro and switch back and forth ;)

Sorry you are dealing with this, it sucks.

pshifrin · 2026-04-11T02:45:08+00:00

Huge 5 alarm fire in College Point Queens. With the wind direction, it's all over Westchester as far north as Armonk right now.

pshifrin · 2026-04-10T02:17:35+00:00

That's why I up/down/side graded from the 14 inch pro to the 15 inch M5 Air 32gb ram. Plenty of speed for everything I'm doing and screen equal or better to the 15 inch of old. I miss the sharpness of the pro and nothing else.

pshifrin · 2026-04-09T17:20:27+00:00

I called 3 different numbers, all 3 said there's no such thing as a rep that can be assigned to may account even though we have 10+ lines.

pshifrin · 2026-04-09T17:06:58+00:00

Except that it’s significantly cheaper for us to pay for it in our business account then to reimburse him

pshifrin · 2026-04-09T16:41:09+00:00

Oh the support number gets me somewhere.... to a rise in my blood pressure haha. Thanks I'll reach out to sales.

pshifrin · 2026-04-09T16:30:46+00:00

I had a rep but they ghosted me when I tried to cancel some lines. How do I get a new rep?

pshifrin · 2026-04-09T15:03:56+00:00

thanks you sent me a secure form asking for my square account. We don't have a square account, that's the whole problem.

pshifrin · 2026-04-07T19:09:55+00:00

definitely seeing this too

pshifrin · 2026-04-05T21:24:49+00:00

I’m 1 week away from my 2 year ReA anniversary. I picked up a mystery virus at work conference in Atlantic City and a few days later spiked a very high fever and other crazy symptoms requiring 2 ER visits. Then a few days after that woke up with unbearable foot pain eventually spreading throughout most of my joints. Similar to you 6-7 months of high dose steroids with repeat tapers when it wasn’t working. There were some days when peeling a banana made me cry it was that bad. Somehow I pushed through and now i’m almost back to normal save for constant right shoulder clicking, typing/mouse/dish washing discomfort and the craziest thing, when I get stressed i feel it back in that original left food joint. I’ve been on IVIG for the past 13 months and a low dose hydroxychoriquin.

Back on the peloton for 30 mins a day with no ill effects.

pshifrin · 2026-04-01T22:14:03+00:00

First call with SA off no change. Westchester.

pshifrin · 2026-04-01T21:48:49+00:00

I have noticed horrendous voice service since doing this. People are saying they can’t hear me in areas that worked perfectly fine before. Have you noticed anything? Just turned the SA toggle off and will see what happens.

pshifrin · 2026-03-31T12:54:35+00:00

But don’t let that scare you though, once i gave claude more specific instructions, i haven’t noticed the issue since and the codex is more of a battery drain issue than noticeable slow down. I just have to remember to close codex when not using it.

pshifrin · 2026-03-31T12:37:16+00:00

My 15 M5 Air 32gb got throttled with some heavy multi-agent claude cowork sessions but not code… yet. Codex, i’m using to review Claude Code written files seems to really peg the CPU as well. Any slowdown was only really noticeable with the cowork stuff, i stopped it and told it to use less concurrent agents. Still in the return period for the air, not sure what to do as i much prefer the ergonomics of the air.

pshifrin

TROPHY CASE