Why does a laptop say it’s at 6-8% charge, and then it dies, but when it’s at a higher charge, going from 60% to 59% takes a while?

Question

Why does a laptop say it’s at 6-8% charge, and then it dies, but when it’s at a higher charge, going from 60% to 59% takes a while?

In: Technology

Answer 1

Because batteries don’t maintain their full capacity throughout their lifetime, and it is very difficult to determine how much charge they actually have at any given time. The battery level is only an estimate.

My phone batteries currently drop out with 4-8% reported left. New, they sat at 1% for the better part of an hour.