Google 45W charger tested: Not quite Watt it’s cracked up to be [Video]

So, the Pixel 9 Pro XL is the first Google phone to get above 30W charging when using the official 45W charger. The results are more interesting than you might have expected.

According to Google’s 45W charger support documents, the real-world charging is closer to 37W. In our test, it actually varied wildly from as high as 32W to as low as 2W during the charging process. This isn’t uncommon, in fact, it’s part of the standard charging cycle of lithium-ion batteries. The curve isn’t linear because as the charge level increases, the resistance rises. This means the charger needs to supply less power to maintain a constant charging rate.

There are tons of other reasons why the charge rate can vary from device to device. Adaptive charging technology is used to adjust charging rates based on factors like the battery temperature, number of cycles or health, and even the wattage variations. Fast chargers most often use a higher initial wattage to quickly top up the majority of your phone battery before reducing that level to prevent overheating or other damage from overcharging.

You can check out our comparison of the charging times/speeds of the Google 45W charger and the older 30W power brick below:

Fast charging? This ain’t it

My biggest frustration is that the Google 45W charger is touted as “fast” or “faster charging” than the previous generations. I’m not sure what is going on, but the charge curve sort of flattens off right around the 60% mark, and the total time to charge the 5,000mAh battery in the Pixel 9 Pro XL takes 1 hour and 17 minutes. If that is a battery heat management protection measure, then that is fair enough.

You might not care if you can get about 50% in around 25 minutes. This is the biggest improvement, not the 0-100% charge time. It doesn’t quite hit the touted 70% in 30 minutes – it was about 65% in our testing which isn’t a million miles away in fairness.

The Pixel 9 Pro is still limited to just 27W and takes around 1 hour 24 minutes to go from 0 to 100%. This is inline with the Pixel 8 Pro, which takes around 1 hour 30 minutes to go from 0 to 100% with supported 30W power bricks.

Even so, that is super slow in today’s market. It’s not even remotely close to the best in the business. Don’t get me wrong, we don’t need 100W+ charging speeds. However, being able to fully charge your phone in under an hour would be a very nice upgrade. Is it worth $30 to save up to 10 minutes in your day? That’s ultimately up to you.

More on Pixel:

• Upgrade paths: Pixel 7 Pro vs. 9 Pro – big leap or small improvements? [Video]
• Hands-on with every official Pixel 9 series case: Worth the money? [Video]
• Everything you should know about Satellite SOS on Pixel 9 before you ever have to use it