Both have their pros and cons, we help you decide which is best for you.
Most homes are trying to reduce power costs by turning off lights and appliances, but do the same rules apply to computers? After all, it requires more than flicking a switch on your way out the door. Some people believe you should shut down after every use to save wear and tear, others believe you should never shut down your computer - ever. Others simply want to make sure the pages and apps they left open are still there waiting for them. So, who’s right and what are they really doing?
Back when computers were clunky behemoths that took a long time to start, you’d go nuts at the person who shut it down when it was your turn. If you have an older computer, maybe you still do. Modern computers actually have two options for their downtime: Shut down or sleep.
When it shuts down, the system goes through and closes any open programs (often prompting you to save first), then gradually cuts power to all components. It’s a methodical process that seems quite fast to us but is actually made of 100+ intentionally ordered steps. If there’s a sudden blackout or you hold the power button until it turns off, it means the steps aren’t followed and damage is possible. The second option is to put your computer to sleep. This can be triggered by an automated timeout or a user click. Your system uses a special type of memory called RAM to hold all your running programs exactly as you left them but use minimal power. The hard drive stops spinning, the graphics card lets the screen go black, and even the system fan slows to become almost silent. When you wake it by moving the mouse or pressing a key, it ‘wakes’ again almost instantly.
Reasons to Shut Down
A switched off computer isn’t drawing power which is a plus for the environment. But shutting down is about more than saving power. It can sometimes give improved stability over a machine that’s been running for days/weeks. This is because every time you shut down, you give your computer a chance to clear out all temporary junk files it’s been carrying in memory. It also triggers various health checks on startup that may otherwise be missed, important routines like checking for updates or scanning for viruses. It’s certainly more convenient to spend an extra minute booting up than lose everything to a cyber-attack. For older computers or those under heavy strain like gaming or video editing, shutting down also provides a necessary chance for the components to cool down which can help extend the life of those components.
Reasons to Sleep
Speed is the big selling point here. You can literally sit down and start working where you left off without the delays of bootup, finding your program, opening your saved files, scrolling down... it’s all right there and ready. You can even tell it how long to wait before putting itself into sleep mode, just in case you get called away and forget. This is extremely handy for laptops as well because you don't need to worry about shutting the whole thing off if you need to move, just close the lid and let it sleep while you go to your destination. The important things like Windows updates still run in the background, so that’s okay, but it’s important to note that your computer might get stuck waiting for a reboot that never comes. Those pending updates may stack up, which may cause Windows to "force" a restart without your knowledge or permission. So just like when you're shutting down, be sure to save any work before you put your computer to sleep!
And the best method is….
Since the whole point of having a computer is that it’s ready to work when you are, we recommend shutting down at night when it’s definitely not in use but using sleep mode during the day. Updates will get all the rebooting they need, memory is refreshed for the new day, and you’ll get the best of both worlds - speed and stability.
....But wait! There's more!
Just when you think you had that question answered, technology comes along to throw a nice big monkey wrench into things. Modern computers using components like Solid State Drives (SSDs) can actually boot up from a shutdown extremely fast. Almost as fast as a system coming out of sleep mode. Also, for computers running Windows 8 or Windows 10, there is a setting within Windows that is located in the power settings called Fast Startup. When enabled, this causes Windows to save a bare minimum set of services to the hard disk and then powers off the computer. When the computer is turned back on, these services are able to be quickly loaded which helps the computer start up faster than it would without this option. With these advances put together, shutting a system down isn't as big of a deal these days as it used to be.
That said, there are still times where you still would be better off just putting the computer to sleep instead of shutting it down completely (see the laptop example above) so we still recommend using sleep during times where you may want to quickly access your system again, while using shut down at the end of the day to enable the maximum power savings and allow the system to clear out all of the temporary junk.