For those who don’t know, European lawmakers reached an agreement earlier this week to force manufacturers of electronic devices, including smartphones, tablets, digital cameras, headphones and more to use the same port. universal charging: USB-C. True, USB-C is all in the law and will come into force in the autumn of 2024 in the EU. Setting up with a common USB-C charger will not only reduce electronic waste, it will also make our lives easier. The benefits of using a single charger with a USB-C to C cable for all devices cannot be underestimated.
As someone who uses an Android phone along with a couple of other devices that already use the same USB-C port for charging, I’m more interested in the part of the legislation that harmonizes fast charging standards with USB PD. This is something that was lost on the main coverage, although it could be the biggest news for the Android ecosystem. Even if you take Apple out of the equation to lag behind its competitors in the fast-charging department, you also can’t ignore the disparity in charging speeds between some flagship Android flagships. But how does the EU agree that USB PD is more common to solve our fast charging problems? We try to make sense of it.
We have reached an agreement on the common charger! ⁇
✔️Mobile Phones, Tablets, E-readers, Digital Cameras & More
🔴 Press conference at 12.30 CEST ➡️ pic.twitter.com/29JmeL0nxe
– IMCO Committee Press (@EP_SingleMarket) June 7, 2022
Fast charge harmonization with USB PD
Before we get started, it’s worth noting that the legislation doesn’t stop manufacturers from creating their own fast-loading standards. This means that manufacturers such as OPPO, Xiaomi and Huawei can continue to push the limits with their proprietary charging methods. What makes the EU agreement is that it induces an element of harmony: you can do it as long as it also supports USB Power Delivery. The agreement mentions compliance with the EN IEC 62680-1 standard and its subsections, referring essentially to the specification of USB power supply, revision 3.0, version 2.0 (ie support up to 100 W) .
From our reading of the EU agreement, we understand that device manufacturers are required to incorporate the USB Power Delivery charging communication protocol if they want their devices to have charging powers greater than 15W. Broadly speaking, however, I hope that all smartphone manufacturers are content with a fixed power level (either 45 W, or even 65 W via PD) thanks to the magic of competition, which allows us to quickly charge any phone with the same charging speed outside of the proprietary methods. Yes, there is also a “fast” charge of 25 W, but it is unlikely to become the common floor to which competition forces everyone to increase: the 45 W seems to be a much better floor. Yes, there is nothing stopping them from just using a 15 W USB PD, but hopefully the competition forces will force the OEM to do better here.
Think of the vanilla Galaxy S22, for example. This particular phone comes with a charging speed of 25 W, which is the same as its predecessor, the Galaxy S21. However, the Galaxy S22 Plus and Galaxy S22 Ultra support a fast charging of 45 W. These require a USB PD charger with programmable power supply (PPS) to recharge the full 45 W, and even then the phones themselves charge a power of 40 W + just a few moments before going down to 30 W. One could argue about the decreasing performance of charging speeds in terms of power consumption compared to charging times, but fill the tank of the 0% to 100% Galaxy S22 vanilla takes much longer than it should for a phone of this size that costs so much. as it does. It’s especially annoying given the less than ideal battery life of the vanilla Galaxy S22.
If the harmonization of USB PD fast charging means that all these phones would adhere to at least one faster USB PD charging speed, this would also make the experience of using these compact phones with smaller batteries be much better. Every time you run out of these phones, it would be easier to find a compatible charger around you that will give you enough juice to last a few more hours. While it’s definitely not a perfect replacement, the ability to quickly recharge a dying phone with supreme ease would make it more enjoyable to use compact phones with relatively smaller batteries. Remember that the standard also applies to laptops, cameras, and other electronic devices, so your chances of finding a compatible charger and cable will increase.
To take another example on Android, the OnePlus 10 Pro can power up to 45 W via USB PD with support for 15 V and up to 3.0 A, and that’s when you look beyond the patented charge 65 W / 80 W that OnePlus uses as a point of sale. The charging speed of the PD, however, is still sensitive to specific voltages and changes depending on the current change of the battery. USB PD 3.0, in case you didn’t know, dropped fixed power profiles in favor of a more flexible rule that maintains a fixed voltage while allowing for a wider range of current levels. The USB Power Supply Programmable Power Protocol relieves some of these problems with configurable voltage levels. It’s probably not as easy to settle for a common USB PD charging speed as we imagine given how charging speed is sensitive to specific voltages and also changes depending on the current battery charge, but this requires a discussion greater at the technical level. to fill in the gaps.
Fast charging for or missing iPhones
The idea of harmonizing fast charging is especially interesting for iPhones that remain the popular resistors of USB-C charging. Even the most powerful iPhones on the market now use a Lightning port, the patented connector that Apple introduced in 2012 with the iPhone 5. iPhones have improved in terms of charging speed over the years, but charging speeds current ones are still nothing. to sneeze.
Even if you spend an arm and a leg buying an expensive 30 W Apple charger for your iPhone 13 Pro Max, it can take up to an hour and 30 minutes to go from 0 to 100%. But do you know what can solve this underlying charging problem that doesn’t affect iPhones, but also many other Android phones out there right now? Yeah Al that sounds pretty crap to me, Looks like USB PD charging a phone to quickly recharge your battery so we can all carry a single charger or grab one without having to worry about charging speeds.
Look, it’s nice to be able to use your own solutions to quickly recharge a phone. But I should also be able to use any standard USB PD charger and reach, say, 45 W to charge my phone. It doesn’t match what some manufacturers like OPPO are cooking behind the scenes with their 240 W chargers, but I think 45 W is enough to charge a phone, very quickly. Compensation for lower-than-owner speed would be offset by the absolutely widespread availability of USB PD-compatible charger hardware, marking it as a net victory for consumers.
Closing thoughts
While improving loading speeds or achieving loading standards on the market is not the main reason why EU lawmakers have moved the needle, we still need to think about how things can change to improve the autumn of 2024. I have no worries about phones that use their own charge, but I’d like to take more “W” (no pun intended) if harmonizing fast charging with USB PD saves me the hassle of going through different chargers depending on the phones I use.
Laptops will also have to comply with the rule, but this will happen later, and it’s a completely different conversation because it’ll be interesting to see how budget designs handle the policy, as most USB-C charging laptops on the market are more expensive ultralights. models. That being said, I’m just excited to be able to use the same charger for some other devices I carry with me at all times, such as a laptop, cameras, a portable game console, etc., and quickly fill the tank without having to to wait. for long.
Legislation has yet to be voted on by both the EU Parliament and the Council, but let’s talk about it. So what do you think about the decision to standardize USB-C and PD? Also, how do you think manufacturers, especially Apple, will respond to EU policy? Let us know by leaving a line in the comments below.