power-profiles-daemon offers to modify system behaviour based upon user-selected power profiles. There are 3 different power profiles, a “balanced” default mode, a “power-saver” mode, as well as a “performance” mode. The first 2 of those are available on every system. The “performance” mode is only available on select systems and is implemented by different “drivers” based on the system or systems it targets.
Generally “power-saver” mode will limit performance to save power. While in “balanced” mode power-profiles-daemon will attempt to make changes to boost performance when needed. In “performance” mode performance will be maximized at the expense of power.
In addition to those 2 or 3 modes (depending on the system), “actions” can be hooked up to change the behaviour of a particular device. For example, this can be used to disable the fast-charging for some USB devices when in power-saver mode.
GNOME’s Settings and shell both include interfaces to select the current mode, but they are also expected to adjust the behaviour of the desktop depending on the mode, such as turning the screen off after inaction more aggressively when in power-saver
mode.
The power-profiles-daemon project was created to help provide a solution for two separate use cases, for desktops, laptops, and other devices running a “traditional Linux desktop”.
The first one is a “Low Power” mode, that users could toggle themselves, or have the system toggle for them, with the intent to save battery. Mobile devices running iOS and Android have had a similar feature available to end-users and application developers alike.
The second use case was to allow a “Performance” mode on systems where the hardware maker would provide and design such a mode. The idea is that the Linux kernel would provide a way to access this mode which usually only exists as a configuration option in some machines’ “UEFI Setup” screen.
This is free and open source software.
Website: gitlab.freedesktop.org/upower/power-profiles-daemon
Support:
Developer: power-profiles-daemon contributors
License: GNU General Public License v3.0
power-profiles-daemon is written in C. Learn C with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
Related Software
| Power Consumption Tools | |
|---|---|
| TLP | Power management package; features in Essential System Tools |
| auto-cpufreq | Automatic CPU speed and power optimizer |
| PowerTOP | Enable various powersaving modes |
| cpupower | Linux kernel tool |
| power-profiles-daemon | Makes power profiles handling available over D-Bus |
| cpupower-gui | Tool to set CPU frequency limits |
| batctl | Battery charge threshold manager for Linux laptops |
| TuneD | Daemon for monitoring and adaptive tuning of system devices |
| asusctl | Control aspects of ASUS laptops |
| system76-power | Utility for managing graphics and power profiles |
| jolt | Terminal-based battery and energy monitor |
| thermald | Thermal daemon for Intel Architecture |
| powerstat | Measures the power consumption of a laptop |
| LACT | Linux GPU Control Application |
| CPUFreq | System monitor and power manager |
| Wattage | Monitor the health and status of power devices |
| ddogreen | Smart power management tool |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
 Explore our comprehensive directory of recommended free and open source software. Our carefully curated collection spans every major software category.This directory is part of our ongoing series of informative articles for Linux enthusiasts. It features hundreds of detailed reviews, along with open source alternatives to proprietary solutions from major corporations such as Google, Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, IBM, Cisco, Oracle, and Autodesk. You’ll also find interesting projects to try, hardware coverage, free programming books and tutorials, and much more. Discovered a useful open source Linux program that we haven’t covered yet? Let us know by completing this form. |