Early this year (2020) smartphone manufacturers seemingly started shifting away from the hype we witnessed in 2019 involving Quad-camera setups and minimal notches to fast charge capabilities. From the look of things, consumers are more interested in power reliability which has lurked in innovation for several years now. While there have been some improvements in the lithium ion batteries, we still don’t have the kind of reliability we used to have in the days of yore. I remember when I had my Nokia 3310 that used to last for almost a week without hooking on a charger. It was as some may refer to it as: the good-old-golden days.
What we have today and the trend
Today, all we get is a massive mAh without really having a meaningful impact on the reliability of the battery. In fact, from the most recent smartphones unveiled by manufacturers such as Huawei’s Y8p and Y6p which packs a 500mAh battery, alongside Xiaomi’s redmi Note 9 series which comes with a similar capacity, we are only assured of a day long battery at best. This shouldn’t be the case in the 21st century; and in my opinion, its one area where manufacturers have terribly failed us.
The current trend has focused more on the charging technology rather than the battery itself. Or is it because there hasn’t been a breakthrough in alternative technology, the later might be true which further complicates our efforts on envisioning how the future will look like, but one thing remained true, there’s still a lot to be done on battery technology in smartphones.
Should you look forward to stunning fast charge technology?
To answer this question, we are going to have a look at the current charging technologies on smartphones. Everyone who has owned a smartphone at least is familiar with the wired charging adaptors – and by the way there are current rumors of Apple’s intention to ditch the brick on its iPhone boxes as well as Samsung on its Galaxies.
Wireless charging technology vs Wired fast charge technology
High-end smartphones unveiled in 2020 and by extension 2019 almost certainly support the two technologies. Wired fast charge technology is strides ahead of wireless for obvious reasons, overheating has been the main hinderance of wireless fast charge – even slow charging handsets with the same technology has its own overheating problems.
While we admire the convenience of wireless charging capabilities, we’re still not there yet. Fast charge using wired adaptors seems to have come of age and therefore this should be what most of us should be looking forward in future.