The charging study aftermath: Overnight charging is going out of fashion
This week, we explored how charging speed affects the battery’s capacity. We also asked for your preference in charge rates. While fast charging is the most popular method of charging, overnight charging seems to be out of favor.
It was already on its way out a couple of years ago, but it was still the preferred method for a quarter of voters. Now that number is down from 25% to 15%. Slow charging has the advantage that you can always use one of your low-power chargers. We wish Android exposed better controls for charge speed, but even without on-screen controls it is easy enough to keep a 5W/10W charger at your night stand.
Most voters will go for a phone in the 25-33W range. These charge fast enough with no downsides. They don’t have an additional charge like phones with the most advanced charging technology.
Speaking of, the phones that support 100+ Watt charging were the second most popular category, narrowly beating the 50-67W devices, which came in third. We can see why charging is such a hassle and that people want it to be done quickly.
Doesn’t it damage the battery, though? Not so much, say manufacturers, who claim that it will retain 80% of its original capacity after several hundred cycles – some promise to match the 800 cycles industry standard, others even promise to exceed it twice and go as high as 1,600 cycles. Keep in mind that 800 cycles is over 2 years of daily charging from 0 to 100%.
Many phones with super-fast charging are advertised as gaming phones. At two years old a mobile GPU will be noticeably lacking in capabilities compared to new models. So, even if the battery is as fresh as the day it came out of the factory, the device will not be a great gaming phone anymore.
One concern that should not be ignored is the fact that this generates e-waste. These days a phone with a dead battery may not be worth the price of the repair, if you can even find someone to do the repair. A dead battery used to be a 60-second, no-tools-required kind of fix when batteries were user-accessible.
The EU has been working on a way to bring that back. Legislation will mandate that all consumer electronics have user replaceable batteries with “basic and commonly available tools”. The EU is also considering setting requirements for how long phones should be supported – it might demand 7 years of updates and availability of spare parts. These two factors can help make battery life more manageable. This will be something we’ll keep an eye out for from manufacturers.
