GPU-related high battery use on MacBook Pro with Touch Bar

[stshank]

Did you search for similar issues before submitting this one?
Yes

Describe the issue you encountered:
I was trying to figure out who was eating my battery on new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar. Apple's Activity Monitor utility reported that Brave requires high-performance GPU, which I read as the AMD discrete chip, not the integrated Intel graphics. Activity Monitor reported this requirement down to having one last website open, pretty static (http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=176060&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=2232897), and then with no windows at all, and with the new-tab page showing. I have LastPass and PDF Viewer extensions running.

Google Chrome also requires high-performance GPU (at least at the moment I checked, with light load of websites). Safari and Firefox do not.

This could be related, but it's not clear whether this is considered a problem with newer Macs.
https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=479299

The gfxCardStatus (https://gfx.io/) utility reported that Brave Helper required the GPU. When I quit Brave, the Mac immediately switched to integrated Intel GPU. When I relaunched immediately afterward, Brave did not require the high-performance GPU (AMD Radeon Pro 460).

Expected behavior:
Brave shouldn't require or use the discrete GPU for ordinary websites.

• Platform (Win7, 8, 10? macOS? Linux distro?):
  MacOS 10.12.2

• Brave Version (revision SHA):
  Brave 0.12.15
  Muon 1.4.31
  libchromiumcontent 53.0.2785.143
  V8 5.3.332.47
  Node.js 6.5.0
  Update Channel dev
  os.platform darwin
  os.release 16.3.0
  os.arch x64

• Steps to reproduce:

1. run Brave.
2. Open Activity Monitor

• Screenshot if needed:
  Attached Activity Monitor screenshot

[bsclifton]

Related: electron/electron#9842

As a work-around, you can pass the command line option to Brave:
--force_discrete_gpu=0

However, we need to understand this behavior more. The Chromium executable may have GPU detection logic that we're not using

cc: @bridiver

[bsclifton]

+1 via #12112

[stshank]

I filed #12112 as a separate bug because it behaved differently from the one earlier: the discrete GPU fires up on Brave launch, not just on some website that uses it. It seemed qualitatively different if related.

[d-lowl]

I second this for Macbook Pro 2013 (with GT 650M)

[phitboy]

Hi everyone,

Sorry to bump an ancient thread, but how would I go about running --force_discrete_gpu=0 in my mac terminal? @bsclifton says to run it through Brave, but i am not sure how to do that

[sebastiankruk]

I tried

/Applications/Brave.app/Contents/MacOS > ./Brave --force_discrete_gpu=0

also with _gpu=1

did not work :(

[arkag]

I'd like an update on this... This is one reason why I can't justify using Brave on my Mac when I love what they're doing with their browser. Having my discrete GPU up while I'm just browsing normal websites kills my battery.

[fatboyjim]

+1

Macbook Pro 2014 user. I love the browser but I can't use it as my default browser because it rinses my battery through requiring discrete GPU which has a huge impact on battery life.

[byoung0589]

I also ran into this issue and created a bug: https://community.brave.com/t/brave-energy-consumption-issues-on-mac/17035/2

This issue is causing me to not use Brave when I am on Battery power and thus decreasing my time on the browser.

[NumDeP]

+1 https://community.brave.com/t/brave-energy-consumption-issues-on-mac/17035

[tomoapp]

+1 Macbook Pro (Retina, 2014)

Consumes all CPU / Energy; Macbook physically overheats if use 20+ Brave tabs.

<3 Brave but cannot use until this is resolved.

[bsclifton]

For folks experiencing this, can you please try the new Developer channel build and report back?
https://brave.com/download-dev

I suspect this has been fixed and will close. Let's re-open if the issue still re-occurs with the new Developer channel (brave-core)