Charging your phone as fast as possible is an underrated priority when it comes to buying phones. More and more manufacturers are offering fast charging adapters with their smartphones these days, but even these pale in comparison to what we might be getting later in 2020 on the Galaxy Note 20.
IT Home (via TechRadar) reports that Samsung, along with Apple, Huawei and Oppo, are all working on implementing GaN (gallium nitride) chargers into their products in the coming year.
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Gallium nitride would replace the standard silicon used in most chargers devices today, and would make charging adapters much smaller, simpler and more efficient, plus the extra wattage will mean you can use the same charger to power other devices, potentially including larger ones like laptops.
The only downside currently is how expensive the technology is to implement. That’s why Samsung’s likely to debut it on a version of its Galaxy Note 20 flagship, or even the Galaxy S21, rather than one of its A-series mid-range devices.
But Samsung, and its rival Apple, really need to up their charging game. The iPhone 11 Pro, Apple’s fastest charging iPhone yet, still only charges at 18W, and uses its proprietary Lightning connector, which means you can't use the charger with a large number of modern products, which tend to use USB-C instead . The Galaxy S20 and Galaxy Note 10 have a slightly better default of 25W, with the option on certain models to use a separate 45W charger.
Xiaomi already sells a 50W GaN charger for its Mi 10 Pro, which can fill the phone’s 4,500 mAh battery in just 45 minutes. It’s great to see the technology already working for one company, but it’ll only have truly caught on once the big players at Samsung, Apple and Huawei start adopting it too.
The Note 20 is likely to launch around August 2020, which is still a few months away. If you can’t wait that long for a fast-charging Samsung flagship, then your best option is the Galaxy S20 Ultra. It’s a very expensive phone, but you get what you pay for, including the option to charge at up to 45W.
