Fundamentally, process powerd is a core component of macOS. Processes ending with the letter 'd' are typically daemons - essential parts of the operating system running in the background, responsible for handling crucial tasks on the system. This powerd daemon manages energy consumption on your system.
When your Mac enters Sleep mode after inactivity, powerd takes on the responsibility for this task. Similarly, powerd is in charge when the hard drive spins down or the screen turns off. You can easily configure powerd settings by opening System Preferences, then selecting the Energy Saver option.
Customize settings here, such as the display time when Mac enters Sleep mode, show charging status when plugged in, and when not.
Delve deeper into powerd configuration by entering the command pmset in the Terminal window. To get an overview of energy management settings, just input the following command, and the results will be displayed on your screen:
pmset -g
Furthermore, to explore more information about energy management settings on Mac, you can visit this link (insert link).
Link: https://developer.apple.com/legacy/library/documentation/Darwin/Reference/ManPages/man1/pmset.1.html
Advice for experienced users: Only those with significant expertise should consider altering these settings.
What to do when Powerd consumes too much CPU?
While it rarely occurs, it's not impossible. Occasionally, users report Powerd excessively using CPU. The quickest remedy is to force quit the process in Activity Monitor. The process will restart, and in most cases, excessive CPU usage will cease.
If this situation persists, the culprit could be faulty firmware settings. In such cases, resetting the SMC can resolve the issue.
On Windows, there are various processes, and one that frequently appears is the Service Host Process. To understand more about this process, please refer to the article on Service Host Process [link here].
Here's an explanation of what Process Powerd is and why it runs on Mac. Hopefully, after reading this article, you'll gain more insights into new processes on Mac and how to prevent them from consuming excessive system resources (including CPU).