Everything You Need To Know About Qi Wireless Charging

Wireless charging is a type of technology that has a ton of potential. Imagine being able to charge your devices without being near any cables. Unfortunately we aren’t there yet. But that hasn’t stopped companies from still adapting wireless charging. Take Samsung for example, they have included the feature to all of their flagship smartphones. Plus they even make their own chargers. But the best thing about this technology is that you can also use devices from other companies. That’s because most of them use the Qi wireless charging standard. Haven’t heard about it before? Well here I’m going to go over everything you need to know about Qi and how it works!

What Is Qi?

Qi is a wireless charging standard that was first published in 2010. Back then it simply described the inductive method of how wireless charging works. They also specified 3 power ranges and schematics of how the the power actually gets transferred between the charging station and device. Not to mention the most efficient and safe ways to achieve that.

The Qi wireless standard has been developed by the Wireless Power Consortium (WPC). It was actually established back in 2008 in New Jersey. Ever since they revealed Qi, a lot of companies started joining them. Most Android phone companies had joined them by 2012 and in 2014 there were already more than 500 phones that supported Qi wireless charging. It took 3 more years till Apple finally joined WPC in 2017. On September 12, 2017 they announced that the new iPhone 8, 8 Plus and iPhone X phones will be supporting the Qi standard. Since then, every new iPhone version has supported wireless charging.

As of June 6th 2019, there are currently 546 companies on the member list.

Power Specifications

What makes Qi so good is that it’s being constantly developed. When it was first revealed in 2009, it was only capable of delivering up to 5 W of power. Since then, WPC has been developing higher power specifications. In 2011, they revealed a medium power specification, which increased the power to 120 W. This is enough to fully power laptops and even computer displays. In 2015 they took it a step further and revealed a high power specification. According to this specification, they can deliver up to 1 kW (1000 W) of power. This is enough to power most home devices, even kitchen utensils.

How Does It Work?

The Qi standard takes advantage of a phenomena called electromagnetic induction to deliver electricity through air. It’s also known as inductive charging. You basically have an induction coil inside the charger. This coil is made out of loops of wire. When you power the charger, the electricity creates an electromagnetic field around the induction coil.

Now the device you are going to charge, will need to have an induction coil inside it as well. When you align this second coil with the charger coil, it will start to charge the device. The second coil basically converts the electromagnetic field into electricity for the device. That’s the simple way of explaining how this technology works.

What Do I Need?

Well first of all you need to have a device that supports wireless charging. Not all phones support it yet, which is why it’s important to check that yours does. Now if it does, then the next step would be to buy a Qi wireless charger. If it doesn’t then you also have an option of purchasing a Qi wireless receiver for your phone. These attach to the USB port and you can keep them inside a protective case.

Compatible Smartphones In 2019

Finding a device that allows you to charge wirelessly without any extra accessories can be tough right now. However with time more and more companies are adding this feature to their gadgets. To make your life easier, I have compiled a list of some newer smartphones in 2019, that come with a built-in Qi wireless standard. Either way I recommend checking your phones technical specs to find out if it supports wireless charging.