How Wireless Charging Works and Why It's Terrible
You’ve seen wireless chargers, the tech is now as common as the smartphones they power. But did you know that they come with a big catch? Today we go over the tech behind wireless charging and just how much it actually takes to get your battery full again.
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https://www.ifixit.com/News/94409/wireless-charging-trading-efficiency-for-convenience
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Big thanks to Creative Electron for the x-rays they sent us!
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Chapters
00:00 Intro
00:18 What to know about wireless chargers
00:36 How does wired charging work
01:11 How does wireless charging work
01:47 Wireless charging issues and some solutions
02:49 Worst Case Scenario of Wireless Charging
03:13 A look at the Tesla wireless charging platform
03:55 Final thoughts
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I know this is 11 months old, but if anyone at iFixit sees this I have a question. I’m seeing some people advocate for USB-C to magnetic charging. The way it works is you plug a small magnetic adapter to both ends of the USB-C port – one for the cable and the other on your phone. You can then charge magnetically instead of actually using the port. Some claim you save wear and tear, but will that be inefficient, or worse, dangerous, when charging the phone?
if phone has to be in contact with the charger, there’s no point of using wireless charger.
sounds like fancy crap for snobs
When I put my Iphone 12 Pro max on a vertical charging station overnight, it only charges to 86%, However if I take my "Smartish gripzilla case off it charges to 100% in the same location? The case is supposed to be wireless charging friendly? (quote smartish website?) And is less than 2mm thick? The charging station was delivered minus a 33W fast charging adapter, which was supposed to be included but wasn’t!! Will one of these adapters allow me to fully charge my phone with the case on? So I don’t have to keep taking it on and off everynight?
any help Greatly appreciated TIA Graham
0:28 meanwhile my wired phone is at 44.5C while charging 💀💀💀
its xioami mi 11i 💀💀💀
This is why I use a magsafe charger on my iphone with only a 5 volt 2 amp power supply to reduce heat. Additionally, I put the phone face down and the magsafe charger facing up so that the heat dissipates upwards and not into my phone. I also make sure NOT to use my phone during charging, as this would also increase heat.
i am using a 5 year old samsung phone for work and the C port sometimes refuses to charge. I clean it regularly but it recently stopped charging. Should I buy a wireless charger
Very interesting information
Wireless charging is cool and being able to just place your phone down and still get it charged, if only a little, can be convenient.
But we have phones with super fast charging and long battery life now. Being able to go from 10% to 25% in 5 minutes in a rush is a life saver for me. Or go from 1% to 50% in 20 minutes. I’d rather have a phone that lasts for a day and a half that can charge from 0-100% in an hour than a phone that barely lasts 1 day with moderate use that takes almost two hours to go from 0-100%, even if the latter has wireless charging.
If I notice my battery is low before going out I can charge my phone for 5 minutes and it’s likely going to be enough.
So I’d recommend turning off your phone while charging wirelessly to make it more efficient and lower the temperature. Charging in an air conditioned room is also ideal.
THE DAY I HEARD WIRELESS CHARGING, I KNEW IT WAS A SCAM. THANK GOD I HAVE FUNCTIONING BRAIN
It is the same electrons bro… 🤦♂️
It’s weird how tech YouTubers make "no wireless charging in a phone" to be a really bad thing, considering how less efficient it is.
Terrible video. It generalised everything the way news channels do. There are more charging standards. Some even come with active cooling.
It’s unbelievable that even wired charger used in best condition can lead to 35% energy loss. That’s a lot. We should stop increasing charging wattage/speed but rather find a way to charge the most with the least amount of power.
Its not wireless whet you have to put your phone down. Wtf
Everything wireless is terrible 😂
Isn’t this pretty common knowledge that the more "work" it has to make, the more excess heat gets "lost"
so anything wireless was less efficient..
like your internet.. wifi or cable, always the cable can provide internet more faster and more stable also more robust rather than the wifi..
and wireless charging is less efficient because the distance between the two each coil..
even their distance was so close, but that means there was a resistance between them..
and wired charging, have the lower resistance and that’s why wired charging much more efficient and create less heat rather than wireless which have higher resistance and create more heat..
and the heat generated by the coil can heat up the phone battery and slowly damaging it..
In my opinion wireless charging is useless and manufacturer should remove and put the budget on hardware/repairability instead unless your telling me u too lazy to plug a single cable into ur phone
Wireless charging shouldn’t be the only way to charge. I like wireless charging with bikes/cars because we don’t try to use them when they’re charging, but with phones people will usually use their phones while its charging.
Temperature depends on the area u live in. Normal battery temp here is above 30 degrees
Me literally using a wireless charger every day!!! 😭😭😭
Wireless charging is about to be my life saver as my charger port starts going out
i dont get it. why just dont make charging platform which slides into usb-c or like home phones in 90’s. instead of wireless.
Transformer work on the same effing principle. An they are EVERYWHERE.
I thought we’re supposed to be conserving resources because of climate change and now we are wasting energy through wireless charging.
I still own a LG V60 which now is 4 years old. About after 2 years the USB-C connector failed and since LG by then left the market they didn’t care to service it, that is, they sent the phone back telling me they found nothing wrong with it (a plain lie, I don’t think they didn’t care to open the device at all.) I decided to live with it and just charge the phone wirelessly (Qi-1). I did so successfully for the passed 2 years never caring about energy efficiency or wether it got too hot since I never dove into the topic until right now. I tried however to keep the charge under 80% and not discharge it under 15% which mostly worked. An app reminded me when 80% was reached so I disrupted charging manually. So I was able to use the phone 2 years passed it’s USB-C death. Just now the battery has started discharging quiet rapidly. But any battery has it’s life cycle so I cannot determine if this is due to extensive daily battery use and abuse for 4 years straight or due to 2 years of Qi-charging. I’ll miss my LG.
Hey industry, yes you who is selling us phones, tablets and laptops at ridicioulus price tags, please give back to us a barrel type charging port that doesn’t wear out like the Titanic on it’s first journey. Plus give back to us expandable memory and exchangeable batterie compartements. Stop deceiving us for good with planned obsolences. Producing an irreparable iPhone for 10 bucks to sell it to us for 1,500. Greedy morones.
I put a tupperware lid between my phone and the charger which slows the charge speed and reduces the temperature of the battery while charging. Manufacturers could limit charge rate through software instead but fast wireless charging looks better on a spec sheet.
for me personally its not really about how it impacts the environment.
phone nowadays (generally) have bigger battery and fast charging, it just makes the concept of wireless charging moot to me.
i could literally plug my phone to my charger, do dishes or some other activity for like 5-10 minutes, and i can easily get 50-60% charge from like 15%. even if im not using something ridiculous like 100W charging.
For the pad, Im kind of curious if a better design would be to use a single coil and detect the phone’s position (maybe with pressure sensors) and have the pad move the coil into place under the phone?
Magsafe may be a better idea, but you could make a very large pad with a few mobile coils for various devices.
Thank you
Thanks for this great video! I does clarify a lot of things in a simple way, thank god I only use wired charging. I have a question; besides the bigger energy consumption, what if we can keep the phone and pad cooled during chargin with a fan? Wouldn’t that mitigate the temperature that’s degrading the battery over time?
I wish more wireless chargers had active cooling (not TEC, just a heatsink and small fan on a thermostat)
@00:35 is gets hotter then 30 degrees for half the year. We dont live in antartica.
im a truck driver, the problem with wired charging is it wears out the charging port. i constantly have issues with my connector unplugging or not making a good connection. i use my phone at work far more than most people
Never charged my phone wirelessly even though I had capable phones.
Probably never will until it is absolutely necessary.
Wired is better even when you have to use your phone while charging.
Thanks for your research and a great video.
i dont understand the point of wireless chargers in the first place? the only way i see it slighlty more usable is like a magsafe battery pack or smth but like apart from that what use does it haver!?
But wireless chargers are wired…and less convenient
Totally, my iPhone 15 Pro Max already have only 92% battery health since I’m only charging at night using a 3rd party wireless charger, I’ve long suspected this might be the culprit.
I only have it for 15 months.
I don’t give a toss about the extra energy used. Sry earth. But we gotta move forward
When I use the USBC port I get the message on my phone in the morning after it’s charged that there is moisture or some type of contamination in the port and it won’t let me charge it again for six or seven hours or so and I have inspected the port with a powerful flashlight even a magnifying glass and it is crystal clear clean so I don’t understand what that’s all about
With how finnicky the USB-C standard is, I’ll take my Qi2 charger over carrying the wrong cable only to find out it’s a USB2 with max 0.5 Amps.
I first started using wireless induction charging in 1972 when I bought my electric toothbrush. The phone makers are just now catching up from 1972. My toothbrush lasted about 2 years always worked fine. Eventually, the 4 sets extra brushes that attached to it wore out so I just bought another one. Still have all my pearly whites except for 1 when my ex-girlfriend threw a beer bottle at me and I didn’t duck in time.👺🦷
Shocking, but we have to give kudos to Apple for helping develop the Qi2 spec to give magnetic wireless alignment charging to android phones. They certainly didn’t have to and it could’ve been a proprietary technology they developed and kept in house to differentiate iPhones over android.
It’s just a great solution to improve wireless charging that benefits all smartphones. Plus, the magnetic back is really nice to use as a stand at home or in your car. With it being more widespread on all phones, it’s more common to see magnetic accessories available for all phones.
Hopefully Apple gets rjt courage to remove wired charging
One missing data Point here is how much faster does it degrad the battery.
I thought the point was to reduce wear from physical contacting. Is this worth it? Probably not…
My watch is the only device I charge wirelessly. I do not have the patience for wireless beyond that and all the hits and misses I have experienced with alignment and trying to pocket a hot de vice
My phone’s manufacturer will stop pushing security updates for my device before wireless charging has any negligible effect on my battery. So it’s a non-issue until I upgrade.
Well explained