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Awhile ago I wrote an article that covered various ways you can monitor the remaining battery life of your laptop, but I was starting to wonder what kind of apps developers had come up with for Windows 7 users. Interestingly enough on that same article a commenter, Chris, talked about a nice free app called BatteryBar that did everything I was looking for.

BatteryBar works on various versions of Windows, but my focus was on Windows 7 since that’s what I’m using at the moment. The Taskbar icon is both compact and informative, and even more details can be revealed if you click on the icon. After you’ve used the app for a while it will also be able to tell you exactly how many minutes you have left before you’re battery is fully drained, but I hadn’t been using it long enough to see that calculation at the time I took the screenshot.

If you really like BatteryBar you can always take a look at the “Pro” version that offers some additional features, including themes and the ability to quickly switch between power profiles (on Vista/Windows 7). How much does it cost? Between $1 and $10… basically whatever you feel the app is worth, but the “lifetime” license starts at $6. You can always tinker around with the 30-day trial if you want to play with the customizability and preferences that are only available in BatteryBar Pro:

(Click to Enlarge)
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Note: After installation you may have to right-click on the Taskbar, and go to the Toolbars menu in order for BatteryBar to appear.

BatteryBar Homepage (Windows only; 32-bit/64-bit; Freeware)
Thanks Chris!

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