Does Freezing Your Laptop Battery Work?

My laptop battery recently died, and would not hold a charge, so I did some research online about how to revive it and came across an odd suggestion to freeze my laptop battery. I really didn't have much to lose, as my battery was already completely dead, so it was either freeze it or buy a new one. I decided to stick it in the freezer.

I stuck my battery in the freezer for 24 hours, please note that this is a lithium ion battery and this method will not work for nickel-cadmium batteries. I wrapped the battery in a plastic bag to avoid condensation, as any water getting inside the battery will ruin it. When the 24 hours were up, I took the battery out and tapped it on the table kind of hard, this was done to break up the crystallization inside the battery.

I put the laptop battery inside the laptop after it warmed up to room temperature, if you put it in before then, it will probably wreck your battery, and maybe even your laptop. I then let my battery charge for 24 hours, and did not turn on the laptop, this is done to make sure that the battery takes a charge if it can. So after this, I powered on my laptop and it did hold a charge for about 30 minutes. Not bad, but not great, I still ended up having to buy a new battery but I wonder if I had done this earlier or for longer what the results might have been. It definitely did work and gave my battery at least some life.

Freezing your laptop battery is a last resort, if all else fails, there is no harm in trying it. I got a 30 minute charge, which was able to sustain me long enough until I could go to the store and buy a new battery. Lithium ion cells only hold a certain amount of charges, usually 500, before they die completely and there is no way around this. However freezing your laptop battery may enable you to squeeze the last few charges out of your battery.

In conclusion, you should freeze your laptop battery, it won't hurt and might save you money and give you time until you can buy a new battery. Just make sure to follow the steps I took, if you want optimal results, maybe even leaving the battery in longer then 24 hours might be ideal.