Battery charging.

I have a DSTE EN-EL18 in my Nikon grip on the D500. The battery came as a single unit, slide in replacement battery tray with a built in charger and both 110 and 12 volt charging leads which is very convenient. I am in the habit of topping up the battery at the end of each shooting session regardless of usage. Is this a good practice or should I let the battery discharge fully periodically then charge it?

My understanding is that all such batteries have a lifecycle that limits the number of times it can be charged. Not sure what that is on this particular battery (check the Nikon website), but I would say that you're probably doing yourself a disservice and might need to replace it sooner than otherwise. Just a guess.

BackdoorHippie said:

My understanding is that all such batteries have a lifecycle that limits the number of times it can be charged. Not sure what that is on this particular battery (check the Nikon website), but I would say that you're probably doing yourself a disservice and might need to replace it sooner than otherwise. Just a guess.

Click to expand...

I believe you are speaking of lifecycles of nickel batteries. And even that applies to full cycles, many small partial cycles are probably a good thing. However lithium batteries are going to lose capacity in 2 or 3 years, regardless if you use them at all or not.

Here's an article that says many small charges are desirable.

How to Prolong Lithium-based Batteries - Battery University

Many internet articles are by writers who don't actually know quite as much as they make up. But this one does, it is an extremely knowledgeable source.

First world problems. LOL

I have an old dlsr from 09 with over 200K clicks using the still working factory battery. At the replacement cost of these batteries I would not lose any sleep over it.

Samo said:

First world problems. LOL

I have an old dlsr from 09 with over 200K clicks using the still working factory battery. At the replacement cost of these batteries I would not lose any sleep over it.

Click to expand...

The lithium batteries don't necessarily all fail, but their capacity decreases. With age, now capable of fewer photos per charge. At seven years, my bet is that you won't any longer be able to go run off a few hundred photos on one battery. This is why there are so many replacement batteries sold. Cell phones suffer the same issue with age.

No doubt batteries do go bad. LOL

I miss wind up cameras. Not.