A laptop's battery life depends on how you use it. Some activities are more intensive than others and will drain the battery faster. Manufacturers tend to favor testing methods that produce the longest battery life claims, while end-users want to know how long the battery will last in everyday use.

The UL Procyon Battery Life Benchmark continues the Battery Life Profile concept we pioneered in PCMark 10. Instead of producing a single number, the UL Procyon Battery Life Profile provides a broad view of practical battery life across a range of real-world scenarios. The Video Playback and Idle and Office Productivity scenarios are available now and further scenarios are already in development.

The UL Procyon Battery Life Benchmark is easy to install and run—no complicated configuration is required. Run the benchmark from the graphical UI or via the command line. View benchmark scores in the app or export detailed result files for further analysis.

UL Procyon benchmarks use real applications whenever possible. Updates to those applications can affect your benchmark score. When comparing two or more systems, be sure to use the same version of each application on every system you test.