iPhone 17 tipped for major charging boost — here's what we know

Render of the alleged design of the iPhone 17 Pro

(Image credit: FPT/Asher Dipps)

While the iPhone continues to dominate the American smartphone market, one area where it severely lags behind is in charging speeds.

Officially, the current iPhone devices max out at 20W charging, which certain Android rivals have left in the dust. The OnePlus 13, for example, can hit 100W charging in most markets (though ‘only’ 80W in the U.S. due to different voltages) meaning the phone can go from empty to nearly full in under half an hour. By contrast, in our testing, the iPhone 16 Pro only reached 56% in the same time.

So there’s some potentially good news incoming. According to a note from investment firm GF Securities seen by MacRumors, the whole of Apple’s flagship smartphone range — iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Air, iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max — will feature 35W wired charging speeds.

On paper, this seems like good — if not great, given the competition’s speeds — news. But there are a couple of important caveats to note.

Faster than advertised

iPhone with USB-C charging cable — (Image credit: Shutterstock)

Firstly, the charging speed of the iPhone itself is only half of the equation. You need a plug that can output to that level or higher — and remember that since 2020, Apple has only included a cable in the box.

But more importantly, you may not notice that much of a speed boost anyway. Notice how I wrote that “officially” the charging speed is 20W in the second paragraph? That phrasing was deliberate, as unofficially there’s plenty of evidence to suggest that iPhones can charge faster than that already — albeit not consistently.

You need a plug that can output to that level or higher — and remember that since 2020, Apple has only included a cable in the box.

This was first spotted back in 2021, when the YouTube channel ChargerLab found that the iPhone 13 Pro Max could hit speeds of nearly 27W with a faster plug. More recently, the site found that the brand-new iPhone 16 Pro Max reached a peak of 37 watts using Apple’s 140W USB-C adapter (though the average was closer to 30). In its test for the regular iPhone 16, it found the maximum be around 24W.

Taking all of this together, it sounds like there might be a modest improvement to iPhone 17 Pro charging speeds, but it’s the regular models that will benefit the most — assuming the GF Securities insights prove to be correct.

We’ve a long time before we find out for sure. Apple has consistently released its numbered iPhones in September for over a decade (with one pandemic-shaped rescheduling to October in 2020), so we’re still seven months away from the iPhone 17’s release.

In the meantime, we’re expecting to hear news of Apple’s latest budget handset — the iPhone SE 4 — today. You can catch up on the very latest news in our iPhone SE 4 live blog as it happens.

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Freelance contributor Alan has been writing about tech for over a decade, covering phones, drones and everything in between. Previously Deputy Editor of tech site Alphr, his words are found all over the web and in the occasional magazine too. When not weighing up the pros and cons of the latest smartwatch, you'll probably find him tackling his ever-growing games backlog. Or, more likely, playing Spelunky for the millionth time.