Engadget compares the battery life of the 2011 15-inch MacBook Pro and the 2026 16-inch MacBook Pro M5 Max. In 2011, Nilay Patel's video rundown test showed 7 hours of battery life. Fifteen years later, the M5 Max model lasted 30 hours and 46 minutes — more than four times longer.
Despite this massive gain, the battery capacity grew only about 30%, from 77.5 watt-hours to 99.6 watt-hours. The improvement comes almost entirely from hardware efficiency. Average power draw dropped from roughly 11W to 6.2W by Apple's figures, and Engadget's own testing shows a drop from 10.4W to about 3.2W.
The 2026 model also charges far faster. Its 140W USB-C adapter (up from 85W) can reach 50% in ~30 minutes, delivering roughly eight hours of browsing — more than a full 2011 charge. Both batteries are rated for 1,000 cycles to 80% capacity, though the 2011 machine cannot run macOS versions newer than High Sierra.
Apple kept the battery just under the FAA's 100 watt-hour flight limit. Meanwhile, the newer laptop is 16% lighter (4.7 vs 5.6 lbs) and 31% thinner (0.66 vs 0.95 in), packing more capacity into a smaller frame.
Source: Engadget · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing