Windows 10’s new ‘Eco mode’ feature could be a lifesaver for laptop batteries
Early testing reveals some considerable performance benefits, too
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
Windows 10has a new preview build and it’s rolling out a nifty feature which aims to tame apps that are using too many system resources, therefore helping combat battery drain with laptops, and improving overall performance (among other benefits).
The ‘Eco mode’ for Task Manager introduced withbuild 21364is labeled as an experimental feature at the moment, so this is still very much early days. Indeed, currently it’s only rolling out to a small number of testers, but it’ll be “gradually rolled out to everyone in the Dev Channel”,Microsoftnotes (if testing doesn’t encounter any major hitches, presumably).
The idea here is that when you pop into Task Manager – which gives you an overview of any running processes on the system, and their respectiveCPU, memory and disk usage, among other things – you can take action against resource-sapping applications by turning on Eco mode (simply by right clicking on an app, and applying the mode).
Apps running in Eco mode already will also be highlighted in the ‘Status’ column, so you can see them at a glance.
Eco mode attacks on two fronts, as explained in a detaileddev blog postby Microsoft: it reduces the base priority of the process in question to ‘low’, and also applies ‘EcoQoS’ mode.
This means that first of all, other apps are getting priority for system resources, and EcoQoS ensures that the “process is executed in the most power efficient manner”. That could mean dropping the clock speed of the CPU, leading to overall better thermal performance – another important consideration for laptops – and less battery usage. The system also runs better and more responsively in general.
Microsoft observes: “We see up to 4x improvements (or ~76% reduction) in UI responsiveness on a CPU contended [busy] system.”
Get the best Black Friday deals direct to your inbox, plus news, reviews, and more.
Sign up to be the first to know about unmissable Black Friday deals on top tech, plus get all your favorite TechRadar content.
Task Manager itself was sped up by 76% when Eco mode was applied to the resource-hogging synthetic workload Microsoft used for testing, but other apps saw considerable benefits too, includingMicrosoft Wordwhich launched around 52% faster, and Edge was 49% quicker to fire up (with no tabs).
Those performance improvements are certainly very worthwhile, and the added battery life that Eco mode should facilitate is obviously more than welcome, too. Particularly given recent stories aboutapps chomping up worrying amounts of system resourceswhen running in the background (such as theEpic Games Store).
Processor priority
For now, Eco mode focuses on CPU usage only – the main part of the equation when it comes to power-efficiency – but in the future, other system resources could feel the benefit as the feature is expanded.
As a final note, Microsoft clarifies that testers who get to play with Eco mode may notice that it is applied toMicrosoft Edgeor Chrome, when they haven’t enabled the feature for these browsers.
Microsoft explains: “This is due to both Microsoft Edge and Chrome experimenting with lowering base priority and applying power efficiency APIs to improve efficiency which is similar to what Task Manager is doing to identify ‘Eco’ efficient apps. You may see other apps with ‘Eco mode’ if they adapt to similar techniques to improve efficiency.”
Darren is a freelancer writing news and features for TechRadar (and occasionally T3) across a broad range of computing topics including CPUs, GPUs, various other hardware, VPNs, antivirus and more. He has written about tech for the best part of three decades, and writes books in his spare time (his debut novel - ‘I Know What You Did Last Supper’ - was published by Hachette UK in 2013).
Windows 11’s Paint and Notepad apps are getting smart new AI features – though one of the best will be for Copilot+ PCs only
Windows 11 24H2 misery continues, as Microsoft’s buggy update is now breaking printers – especially on Copilot+ PCs
ChatGPT just got easier to find when you’re searching for something
