Acer Nitro battery charge limit not available in Linux

Bangkah · 2026-02-09 17:44:52

Hello Arch community,

I am using an Acer Nitro laptop and trying to set a battery charge limit (for example 80%) in Linux to preserve battery health, but it seems the feature is not available.

System information:

Laptop: Acer Nitro (ANV16-71)
OS: Garuda Linux (Arch-based)
Kernel: 6.18.0-zen1-1-zen

TLP output:

```
sudo tlp-stat -b

Plugin: generic
Supported features: none available

charge_control_start_threshold = (not available)
charge_control_end_threshold = (not available)
```

I also checked manually:

* /sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/ → no charge_control_end_threshold
* BIOS → no battery limit option available
* acer-wmi kernel module loaded, but no battery control interface
* KDE PowerDevil also does not expose any charge limit options

It appears that the firmware does not expose battery charge threshold control to Linux.

My questions:

1. Has anyone successfully enabled battery charge limit on Acer Nitro in Linux?
2. Is there any kernel module, EC tool, or workaround available?
3. Is it possible to reverse engineer EC registers safely for this purpose?

I am also interested in developing an open source tool if the EC interface can be identified.

Any help or information would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

5hridhyan · 2026-02-09 17:47:48

https://bbs.archlinux.org/misc.php?action=rules
Garuda Linux is not supported here!

Is it possible to reverse engineer EC registers safely for this purpose?

I recommend not to.... and incorrect writes can end up bricking it!

also If charge_control_* is missing under /sys/class/power_supply, it means the firmware does not expose battery thresholds via ACPI. TLP, PowerDevil, etc. can only use what the EC/BIOS provides.

Last edited by 5hridhyan (2026-02-09 17:51:00)

Bangkah · 2026-02-09 17:51:58

Thank you for the clarification and for pointing out the rules.

Although I am currently using Garuda Linux, I understand that this is a downstream Arch-based distribution. My main goal is to investigate this at the Linux kernel and hardware level, since the issue appears to be related to firmware/EC exposure rather than the distribution itself.

From my understanding:
The battery interface only exposes standard power_supply attributes
No charge_control_end_threshold is present
TLP reports "Supported features: none available"
acer-wmi module is loaded but does not expose battery control

This suggests the EC or firmware does not expose charge threshold control to the Linux kernel.

My intention is not to perform unsafe EC writes, but to understand whether:

This is a firmware limitation, or
Support could potentially be added via a kernel driver (similar to thinkpad_acpi or ideapad_laptop)

If anyone with Acer Nitro hardware on Arch Linux (or other Linux distributions) has investigated this, I would appreciate any insight.

Thank you.

5hridhyan · 2026-02-09 18:00:52

Yep, the limitation is at the firmware/EC level, also driver support (like thinkpad_acpi or ideapad_laptop) depends on the EC providing an interfaces, and without that, Linux cannot implement battery charge limits, for learning purposes, you can study the kernel power_supply framework and ACPI interfaces safely, but note that enabling charge control would require EC support from Acer If they have published/documented it, so practically full charge acceptance or manual charging discipline are the options....

Edit
https://www.reddit.com/r/AcerOfficial/c … etup_fan//
also it might be a myth but If you have a dual-boot, set the limit in Windows via NitroSense, then do a 'Full Shutdown' (Shift+Shutdown). Sometimes the EC maintains the limit across reboots even if Linux can't see the toggle.
Warning
Be careful with manual EC writes. I've heard on newer Nitro models (like your ANV16), Acer has been known to disable these thresholds in recent firmware updates because they interfered with Modern Standby sleep states and forcing it via raw EC writes can lead to those 'bricking' risks I mentioned earlier....

Good Luck!

Last edited by 5hridhyan (2026-02-09 18:52:46)

Arch Linux

#1 2026-02-09 17:44:52

Acer Nitro battery charge limit not available in Linux

#2 2026-02-09 17:47:48

Re: Acer Nitro battery charge limit not available in Linux

#3 2026-02-09 17:51:58

Re: Acer Nitro battery charge limit not available in Linux

#4 2026-02-09 18:00:52

Re: Acer Nitro battery charge limit not available in Linux

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