How can you manually check the health of a laptop battery?

The process of manually checking the health of a laptop battery involves various methods to assess its condition. One effective approach is to connect the AC cord and fully charge the battery. By doing this, you can observe how the battery responds to being charged. If the battery reaches 100% and holds that charge without rapidly discharging, it typically indicates that the battery is functioning properly.

In addition, fully charging the battery allows you to monitor its performance during use. If the battery discharges quickly or does not hold a charge after being connected for an adequate amount of time, this can signify that the battery may be failing.

While other options can provide useful insights—like checking for physical damage or inspecting for swelling, which may indicate physical deterioration—these methods do not directly assess battery performance under charging conditions. Measuring the voltage output with a multimeter can also yield useful data, but is less practical for the average user without technical knowledge. Charging the battery and observing results is a straightforward and effective method for evaluating battery health.