Wireless charging will soon be as fast as using a cable

PC Tech June 25, 2015

Less than a minute

There’s good news if you use wireless charging to top up the battery of your device. The Wireless Power Consortium has announced the latest version of their Qi charging standard, which could reduce the amount of time your device takes to charge.

Currently wireless charging pads can only supply a charge of 5 watts, but the new feature – which has the rather straight-to-the-point name of Qi fast charging – will triple this to 15 watts.

This would actually make wireless charging faster than many wired chargers, with the iPad charger using 12 watts to replenish the tablet’s battery.

Wireless wars

The Wireless Power Consortium’s Qi fast charging announcement comes after news that the Power Matters Alliance (PMA) and Alliance for Wireless Power (A4WP), which both produce wireless charging alternatives to Qi, have merged.

With its rivals ganging up Qi charging could have been in trouble, but if Qi fast charging delivers on its promises we might start to see a clear winner in the wireless charging race.

Via Tech Radar