Laptop Battery Not Charging

In today’s digital age, laptops or notebooks have become a vital part of our day to day life. “Laptop battery not charging” is a very common problem which almost every one of us has been through someday. This word in itself is a nightmare for many of us and really leads to hell lot of frustration. If your laptop battery is not charging then this article will be of great help.

Laptop’s Power Adapter

I have seen many times the problem is with laptop’s power adaptor and we spend our time cursing the battery.
It’s a very simple and basic thing to do before trying out other options. You could follow below steps to do this:

• Try any other adapter by borrowing it from your colleague or friend. Please ensure that the adaptor is of same make and model as your original adapter.
• Plug in the borrowed adapter into the power socket.
• Connect the borrowed adapter into the laptop’s power slot.
• Now check if the laptop’s power slot light has turned on. (Please note that this might work only in some laptop’s like HP wherein it turns light blue as soon as the power is plugged in).
• Now see the tray icon of battery and check if it is showing that it’s plugged in and charging.

If this has worked for you and your laptop battery is charging now. Then it simply means that your laptop’s power adapter is faulty. You might need to replace or repair it depending on the intensity of damage. So head onto your nearest Authorized Dealer or Repair Centre to get it corrected soon. However for a long term view it would be very beneficial if you start taking care of your battery from now onwards.

If above listed method hasn’t worked out for you then it means that your laptop adapter is fine but the problem is likely to be with the battery. Read on to get rid of this problem of laptop battery not charging.

Try Rebooting Battery:

Another possible reason for laptop battery not charging might be that the battery is loose and not connected properly or has been displaced somehow. You could follow below steps to check it:

• First of all shut down your laptop.
• After it shuts down completely, unplug it from power supply.
• Now carefully open the battery panel.
• Remove the battery and clean any dust or dirt with a dry cloth.
• Now plug the battery back into its compartment. Ensure that the battery has been correctly placed at right (positive and negative) terminals.
• Please ensure that the battery is not loose in the compartment. If yes then for the time being you could add some paper on sides to make it tightly fitted into the compartment.
• Now after closing the battery compartment, plug in the power supply of the laptop.
• Restart the laptop now and check if the battery is getting charged now.

If yes then the problem is the loosely fitted battery. You could visit your nearest service centre to get it permanently solved. However for the time being you could easily follow step 6.

N.B.: Please do not put any easily inflammable material like plastic etc as it might get melted because of the laptop heat and might damage it completely.
If this method also didn’t work then there is a chance that your battery drivers are corrupted.

Re-installing Battery Drivers:

As already mentioned if none of the above listed methods have worked out for you then there are substantial chances that somehow your battery drivers have been corrupted. Please use below steps to get it corrected.

• Firstly you need to set up a restore point so that in case of any unfortunate event you could easily restore your laptop.
• After setting up a restore point you need to navigate to Device Manager.
• Windows Vista or Windows 7 Users:

• Click on Start.
• Now type “DEVICE MANAGER” and hit Enter button.

• Windows XP Users:

• Click on Start.
• Now right click on “My Computer” icon.
• Select Properties.
• After selecting Properties, Click Hardware Tab.
• Now select Device Manager Option.

• After navigating to Device Manager. Open it.
• Now search for the word “Batteries” in the panel. Mostly it will be available on top of the list only.
• Once you search it, click on “+” icon to expand the panel.
• Now you will see something with a name “Microsoft ACPI-Compliant Control Method Battery” as shown in below picture.

• Right click on it and select Uninstall option.

• Please cross check that you have not uninstalled any other driver and after cross-checking confirm the Un-installation.
• Once the device driver for battery is uninstalled. Ensure that the driver has also vanished from the Device Manager’s list.
• Now click on “Action” menu available at top of the window.

• After the Action Menu is opened select “Scan for Hardware Changes” as shown in above picture.

Now the device drivers of your laptop battery have been re-installed. So in case the problem was due to corrupted drivers then it should have been corrected by now. Please plug in the power supply and check if your battery is charging now. If not then please follow below listed method to get rid of the problem.

Drain your battery completely using BIOS

I know you will be wondering that how come will we get the battery drained out completely as normally windows hibernates after the battery is less than a particular percentage. Please follow below step to achieve this:

• First of all remove the power supply.
• Now keep the laptop on until the battery level decreases and windows is automatically hibernated.
• Once the laptop is hibernated successfully, reboot it and quickly open the BIOS Settings.
• There are various ways to open BIOS Settings depending upon BIOS and other hardware changes. You could easily navigate to BIOS by reading the BIOS Screen carefully; it will be flashing a message like “For Set Up Press that key”. You need to simply press the key which has been mentioned in the message.
• After this a text based screen for settings will be displayed.
• Please do not press any key or do not do anything on this screen. Leave this screen as it is.
• After sometime the battery will be completely drained out and your laptop will be shut down.

Now try to charge the battery by plugging in the power supply. If this approach has not worked as well then the bad news is that your battery is dead. You can either go to the authorized service centre to get a replacement done. Else you could buy another battery. Another silly option is that you have to live with it that your battery is gone for a toss and your laptop will work only when connected to a power supply.

This was all from me on laptop battery not charging. Do share your feedback or concerns related to any issues related to charging.

Article by Anieee

Anisha holds a Masters Degree in Telecommunications from BITS. She is working as a Software Tester in a top MNC at India. She loves writing, blogging and cracking softwares.