Wireless charging was, years ago, a niche feature that was rarely found or used. But in 2023, the feature is now equipped on almost every major smartphone release, and has picked up widespread placement in many areas of modern life. But according to some folks, “No one uses wireless charging.” Do you?
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Wireless charging has finally become a standard in the smartphone world in the past few years with even the most stubborn holdouts giving in. Now, wireless charging is set to expand a bit further thanks to an updated spec for… NFC?
It’s finally happening, folks. OnePlus is adopting wireless charging. It only took three years after everyone else, but the OnePlus 8 Pro will feature support for Qi charging. That’s great! But personally, I think OnePlus has missed the point entirely — here’s why.
Wireless charging is incredibly convenient and, finally, it’s mainstream too. However, one challenge the tech has always had is the speed of charging. Now, we’re finally making progress with that and Xiaomi is showing off a 40W wireless charging pad that it may use on future phones.
OnePlus has been evading wireless charging for years now but with the OnePlus 8, it finally looks like the company is set to adopt the technology. To add fuel to the fire, it was recently discovered that OnePlus has joined the Wireless Power Consortium, pretty much guaranteeing that the company is bringing the long-awaited tech in the near future.
Qualcomm has a strong presence at MWC 2019, with their chips powering many of the biggest newly announced devices. As phones are continuing to shift away from traditional wired charging to wireless charging, Qualcomm is also updating their Quick Charge technology to be compatible with Qi and other wireless chargers.
Wireless charging has a very long history, and one that almost entirely doesn’t involve the iPhone. Rather, hardware from Android OEMs, including Google itself in the past, has long been the place to find this feature if you want it. In its need to compromise, however, the Mountain View company decided wireless power wasn’t its top priority with the Nexus 5X and 6P, and that continued with the debut of the Pixel and Pixel 2. Now, I’m hoping it’s time for wireless to make a comeback.
While contact-based wireless charging can be handy, the true holy grail is long-range charging – allowing all products to be automatically charged anywhere in a room. We’re not quite there yet, but Energous has been working on the technology for some time now, and has just announced an important step along the way.
The company has received the first ever Federal Communications Commission for power-at-a-distance charging …
One of my favorite smartphone features over the years has been wireless charging. There’s simply nothing that’s more convenient, but nonetheless, we’ve been seeing fewer and fewer devices embracing the technology as of late. One big reason for that may be wireless charging’s biggest flaw – speed.
Wireless charging, while not as popular as it once was, is still one of the coolest features you can get on any smartphone. Qi wireless charging is the current dominant standard, but it appears — according to Korean reports — that LG is hoping to ditch that option for another in one of their upcoming devices.
Like the LG G4, the LG V10 ships without wireless charging built in to the cover as standard. But, like the G4, it does support Qi-standard charging and you’ll need to buy a cover to make it work. LG hasn’t mentioned anything publicly so far, but a “low power receiver” accessory made by LG has shown up in the Wireless Power Consortium’s filings (spotted by etnews), confirming that the Korean tech company is working on a Qi receiver…
Last week, Fonesalesman — the company behind the LG G4 PWRPatch I showed you recently — announced that it is launching a side table with a built in Qi-standard wireless charging unit called FurniQi. It’s made from sustainable bamboo, and is designed to remove the usual clutter associated with having wireless chargers lying around on surfaces, and I unboxed it and built it…
While many flagship smartphones have wireless charging built in as standard, LG opted against it with the G4. Unless you buy the company’s expensive and — in my opinion — unattractive Quick Circle case, you don’t get wireless charging. As always with these kind of problems, there is a solution and all it costs is $15 and a little patience…
Qualcomm announced today that it has become the first company to launch wireless charging that works on devices with metal casing. WiPower is not only material-agnostic, in that it can technically charge all kinds of devices, but it can do so at a distance and charge multiple devices simultaneously. If it works as Qualcomm says it does, this could be one of the most versatile and easy-to-use wireless charging solutions announced so far.
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In one of those moves so obvious in retrospect you wonder why the company didn’t do it earlier, Samsung has announced a monitor with a built-in Qi-compatible wireless charging pad. Just place your Samsung S5 or S6 (or other smartphone compatible with the Qi standard for wireless charging) onto the pad beneath the SE370 monitor and the LED will turn green as the phone charges …
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Samsung’s flagship Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge models include two technologies that are supposed to make charging your device less of a hassle – Fast Charging and both the Qi and PMA wireless charging standards. That’s great! But Samsung’s new ad out yesterday that attempts to subtly throws shade at Apple (the phone alarm in one scene is clearly an iOS tone) and other device makers without built-in wireless charging might be a little too much.
Wireless charging has been around for some time now, but charging pads are really almost as clunky as wires: you still have wires going to the pads, and you have to put your device in a specific place to charge them. What we really want is true wireless charging, where power is beamed directly to the device through the air.
Which is exactly what Energous has been demonstrating at CES with a system it calls WattUp, reports Engadget.
WattUp […] works using a mix of RF, Bluetooth and a lot of patent-pending technology. The transmitter is where most of the magic happens. It communicates with and locates compatible devices using low-energy Bluetooth. Once they’ve established contact with a device, they send out focused RF signals on the same bands as WiFi that are then absorbed and converted into DC power by a tiny chip embedded in the device. These transmitters can be built into household appliances, TVs, speakers and standalone “energy routers.”
What looks like an oversized Internet router beams power up to 20 feet, so have enough of these – or transmitters embedded into other devices around the home – and your portable devices are powered wherever they are. All that’s needed is for the receiving devices to have the necessary chip.
Energous used an iPad app to demonstrate switching power between devices, but the plan is to build intelligence into the system so that it beams power to devices automatically depending on how much charge they have left. Once your phone has enough power, it switches instead to powering your tablet. As you move around the home, power transmission is handed off to the next source in much the same way as your phone switches between different WiFi networks.
Energous wants to license the technology to manufacturers, and the big smartphone manufacturers are clearly in the company’s sights. This, not pads, is the way charging should work, and sooner or later this – or some equivalent tech – is how our portable tech will be charged. I’m very much hoping for ‘sooner.’
Starbucks, in partnership with Duracell, is starting a nationwide rollout of a wireless charging system for smartphones. The system is powered by Duracell’s Powermat technology, which we reviewed last July. The program will place 100,000 of the Duracell chargers at specially-marked tables in each Starbucks location. Users would then be able to charge any phone using a compatible wireless charging system.
So far the program has only rolled out in a few stores, but it’s scheduled to reach more markets by next year. There’s not a timetable yet for when the rollout will be complete.
While the program is only available in a few stores right now, a page on the website for the initiative lists locations where the service is currently offered.
Even though the Galaxy S5 is only just now going up for sale through select third-party retailers, Samsung is already busy announcing a variety of accessories for the phone. As Android Central notes, the company has just announced wireless charging covers for the device.
There will be four different models of wireless charging case to choose from this time around. First is the the standard replacement backplate with a Qi charging module in it. This case will run just $30 and be available in black or white. Next up is an S-View flip cover, again in either black or white, that adds wireless charging capabilities to the device. Samsung hasn’t announced a price for this accessory yet.
All four of these cases will incorporate the gasket that makes the Galaxy S5 water-resistant. The design of the backs are also identical to the dotted-look of the actual backing. As you’d expect, the cases should be compatible with any Qi-based chargers.
