Battery and power

On battery, Storage Studio does less in the background and saves its heaviest work — such as reading your whole disk for duplicates — for when your Mac is plugged in. It eases off further when Low Power Mode is on or the battery runs low, and anything that waits picks up again by itself once conditions improve. Things you start yourself still run.

How it changes on battery

%% caption: How Storage Studio adjusts to your Mac's power
flowchart TD
  A[Storage Studio checks power] --> B{Plugged in?}
  B -->|Yes| C[Normal background pace]
  B -->|No| D[Background work slows down]
  D --> E{Low Power Mode on?}
  E -->|Yes| F[Animations off and background work cut back further]
  E -->|No| G{Battery below 20 percent?}
  F --> G
  G -->|Yes| H[Switches to Light mode]
  G -->|No| I[Stays in its current mode]

• On battery, background work is given a smaller share of your Mac than when it's plugged in, and less again when the battery is below 20% or Low Power Mode is on.
• Below 20% on battery, Automatic performance mode switches to Light, with the note "Low battery — saving power".
• Low Power Mode keeps Storage Studio fully usable but switches off its animations and slows its background work further.
• Rich mode, which gives background work more room, is only ever chosen automatically when your Mac is plugged in.

What waits for power

When a duplicate scan is waiting, the Duplicates window says so — for example "Waiting until you're on power." or "Waiting — Low Power Mode is on." See Background duplicate scans.

Backups and sleep

Each backup can be limited to times when The Mac is plugged in, under Only when in its schedule. It's off unless you tick it. While a backup is held for this reason it says "Waiting for power — you asked for backups to run only when plugged in." You can always press Back up now — the conditions only hold the automatic runs.

While a backup is running, Storage Studio stops your Mac from going to sleep through inactivity — but only when it's plugged in, has no battery, or the battery is above 30%. Below that, it lets your Mac sleep as normal and the backup carries on later. It can't keep a laptop awake with the lid closed on battery. More in Backup speed, battery and the network.

Heat

Power and heat go together. When your Mac is warming up, Automatic switches to Light ("Mac is warming up — effects paused"); when it's very hot, Storage Studio pauses its background work altogether until it cools down. Background duplicate scans also wait while your Mac is running hot.

Quiet Hours

If you use Quiet Hours in its Smart (recommended) mode, you can also set Pause when battery drops below a percentage — 30% to begin with. It only applies on battery power.

See also: Why Storage Studio works slowly on purpose · Is Storage Studio slowing my Mac down? · During meetings, calls and presentations