One of the upgrades coming to the iPhone 16 line-up is faster wireless charging, and you might be tempted to upgrade to a new MagSafe charger, coupled with a beefier charging brick, to take advantage of the 25W charging speed.
But just because you can charge your phone faster doesn’t mean that you should…
The original Qi standard for wireless charging was limited to 7.5 watts. MagSafe doubled that to 15W, and the Qi2 standard matched this.
With the iPhone 16 line-up, however, Apple is further enhancing the wireless charging power.
The charging speeds for the iPhone 16 lineup are the same across the entire lineup this year, including the iPhone 16, iPhone 16 Plus, iPhone 16 Pro, and iPhone 16 Pro Max – with MagSafe wireless charging reaching up to 25W with a 30W adapter or higher. As noted earlier, this is only true if you purchase the all-new MagSafe charger launched alongside the iPhone 16.
This means that MagSafe and Qi2 chargers are no longer interchangeable, as only the latest MagSafe chargers will support 25W; Qi2 remains limited to 15W.
A top comment by Carol Danvers said: “People have become overly paranoid about battery charging, charging cycles, battery health, and battery charging advice (when, where, how much). There are numerous posts on the Apple Discussion Communities where users who bought a new iPhone are outraged because battery health dropped to 98% in the first month. They demand to know if Apple will replace their ‘defective’ battery for free. I have an iPhone 13 whose battery health is still 90% after years of use and charging nightly. I simply don’t worry about it at all. I’m surprised the author of this piece didn’t suggest that Apple released the 25W charger to boost replacement battery sales. I mean, why else would they do it when this article basically says not to do it and it will damage the battery. And again, the advice is to stick to the ‘industry’ standards of Qi and Qi2 and no changes are allowed.”
However, while faster charging can be convenient, it also puts more strain on the battery. So if you’re only using a MagSafe charger for overnight use, then you might be better off sticking to the existing 15W chargers.
Yes, iPhones have built-in intelligent battery-management features, the most significant being that it defaults to an 80% charge until close to your normal wake-up time, and then it tops up to 100%. Such features reduce battery wear, but it still holds true that the faster the charging rate, the faster the battery capacity will degrade.
Given that, for most of us, even a 7.5W charger will fully charge our iPhone while we sleep, and we’re likely to use a wired charger on those occasions when we need a mid-day top-up, the new 25W chargers probably don’t make sense.
Photo by Brandon Romanchuk on Unsplash.
