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Comment by ss3000 | Hacker News Reader

I'm not a huge Apple fanboy by any measure, but one thing I do appreciate is that they consider wireless charging to be a table stakes feature, and include it even in their "budget" phones. They clearly understand how dramatically it elevates the user experience.

Compare that to every Android manufacturer who either don't offer wireless charging at all or gate it to flagships, it's a really sad state of affairs for someone like myself who won't even consider a phone without wireless charging today.

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Never used wireless charging but also never really understood what is so dramatically elevating about it. Is it just the requirement for 1 hand vs. 2 hands that people find so life-changing? Doesn't it waste a ton of power in the process?

(Not using wireless charging either)

One advantage is that it does not destroy the USB port. Constant plugging and unplugging can really wear some ports after 1-2 years, depending on manufacturing quality. To the point that it won't charge anymore. (Hopefully will be less of an issue with USB-C which seems better designed than microUSB). Plus the convenience.

To counter that though, it's not nearly as efficient and the additional heat definitely puts more stress on the battery possibly lowering it's lifespan.

My hunch is that you're probably correct about the heat effects of wireless charging on battery lifespan to some degree, but I'd love to see more emperical studies on the topic. Especially comparing it to usage of wired quick charge solutions that tend to result in much higher spikes in temperature than wireless charging, but over a shorter timespan. It's not obvious to me that one would be more harmful to battery lifespan than the other.

Newer wireless chargers also usually have some form of active heat management (i.e. fans), and anecdotally my phone only ever gets lukewarm to the touch, even with a somewhat bulky case on it.

At the end of the day though, I personally wouldn't mind having to upgrade my phone slightly faster than I would otherwise in order to enjoy the convenience offered by wireless charging, but definitely speaking from a position of privilege here.

A cheap workaround for me is to use magnetic USB connectors & cables. They are small enough to have a connector permanently attached to most my devices and I have several matching cables on my desk, in the car etc.

I found about this option on a motorcycle forum where a specific helmet headset was quite sensible to breaking the micro USB charging port. I bought a couple of cables and several micro-SUB connectors, then I bought a handful of USB-C ones and a few more cables and now everything is by default using magnetic connections.

Seems like an expensive way to workaround a weak port

It's one of those things that you don't think you'd need until you have had it, and then wonder why you've gone so far in life without it.

As someone who constantly has to step away from my desk during the day, I don't have to think about charging the phone anymore. It automatically goes on the wireless stand (directly in front of me) when I'm back at my desk. I can be certain that if I choose to go out for the evening after work, I wouldn't have to worry about being stranded somewhere far from home because my phone died. (Side note: Uber and Lyft have really decimated the taxi industry, even for a downtown area in a medium-size city.)

Oh I see. But putting it in the charger all the time just makes the battery die more quickly, right? Though I see the value now if you don't care about that.

It might lose some life from keeping the battery at a high level, but it will gain life from using the battery less.

If you can keep it from charging too high, it's all upside.

The last 10-20% of the charging causes most battery wear (many times more than in the mid band). So charging from almost-full to full many times per day is going to be harder on the battery than charging fewer times per day.

This is especially pronounced on phones, where batteries are already calibrated to have a high charge cutoff (ie battery longevity vs capacity compromise is heavily at the capacity end).

What I don't get is why phones can't be configured to just never charge past 80% or so, for people who rarely need that 100%, and would rather the battery wear less.

It's a thing for some laptops; e.g. Lenovo specifically advertises such a setting.

Apparently you can do it on rooted Android, though I haven't tried it (eg https://www.androidexplained.com/battery-charge-limit/)

Apple specifically has software features to protect the battery from the consequences of that usage pattern.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210512

You need it to work around the inability to charge while using headphones.

Dramatically evaluate the user experience? It removes inconveniences while adding downsides.

It has been understand that wireless charging causes the battery to heat more, which potentially can decrease the battery lifespan.

People are also constrained in what cases they buy lest it blocks wireless charging.

People cannot use it on the desk when battery is empty.

It is also less efficient when charging, taking more time compared to wired charging.

My Nexus 4 had wireless charging back in 2012; the Nexus 4 very much being a budget phone.

I am a bit disappointed about how wireless charging was ripped out of Android phones instead of simply being the standard. I thought the iPhone finally adopting it would bring it back to Android phones but it does not seem like the case.

Ah yep, the good old Nexus 4, that's how I was introduced to wireless charging as well.

Completely agree. Given that a lot of smartphone maker's model has been to wait for Apple to do something and then copy it (whether it was a good idea or not) I was really surprised that wireless charging didn't become a standard feature for Android phones after Apple added it.

One of the problems with wireless charging is that I typically get a cheap $5 "rugged" case from eBay that lets me drop my phone with harm only potentially happening to my disposable case. unfortunately, those cases block wireless charging

Now I have higher-end phone (AQUOS zero2) but it doesn't feature Qi to make it lighter, and I love the decision. Previously I had Galaxy S8 that features Qi but I don't use it much because it gets hotter while charging so not seems good for battery health.

Adopting Qi has another side effect: it prevents using metal to back surface, so most high-end phones choose to use glass rather than resin so phones are much getting heavier.

I bought an iPhone11Pro and bought a charger. Tried it for about 2 weeks, one of 4 times I'd wake up and it failed to charge. I stopped using wireless charging.

I think there's a reason Apple doesn't sell a wireless charger and that's because they couldn't get it to work reliably. So, they can add the feature to the phone but don't have to take any support calls on how flaky it is since they can blame the non Apple charger.

Is wireless charging like this having any negative impacts on phone battery with daily usage/charging patterns?

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