After bringing MagSafe to iPhones almost four years ago, Apple has announced it will be upgrading the wireless charging standard for the iPhone 16. All four new iPhones will support up to 25W wireless charging thanks to this upgrade, which is a pretty considerable boost from the 15W speeds afforded to other iPhones. Here’s what you need to know.
Naturally your existing MagSafe charger isn’t going to be able to magically offer faster wireless charging on iPhone 16. You’ll need to physically upgrade to one of the new MagSafe charging pads, which are available to purchase from the Apple Store with prices starting at $40.
That’s the same price Apple charged for the old MagSafe charger, which was one of the best wireless chargers, and is no longer listed on the Apple Store website. You can still pick one up at other retailers, and with the new pad incoming you may be able to find it at a discounted price.
Your spending doesn’t end with the $40 pad, though. The old MagSafe charger only needed a 20W charging brick to reach full speed, but the new one needs a 30W charging brick. This being Apple those are sold separately, meaning you may need to buy a faster adapter — assuming you don’t have one already. Apple recommends using one of its own USB-C power adapters, which will set you back at least $39.
Of course any 30W USB-C power brick will work just fine, and it doesn’t have to be restricted to 30W speeds, which is helpful if you already have a faster power adapter. Be it an Apple-branded one from another product (like a MacBook) or one made by a third party. Ikea sells 30W USB-C chargers for just $8, and aside from just being cheap they’re also incredibly compact compared to a lot of branded 30W charging bricks.
There are a few more things you should no before you put your order in. The first is that these new MagSafe charging pads are backwards compatible, and will work absolutely fine with older iPhones and accessories — whether they support MagSafe or not. Naturally they will be limited to existing wireless charging limits, which can be as low as 7.5W for some of the oldest models.
This does mean that non-iPhones should be able to wireless charge using regular Qi wireless charging. Though presumably speeds will be limited to the 7.5W as well. Apple also confirmed that the charger is compatible with the Qi2 standard, should Qi2-compliant phones ever go on sale en masse. While Apple hasn’t specified how fast Qi2 charging will be, but it definitely won’t be any faster than 15W.
Pre-order for the iPhone 16 will open on September 13 (this Friday), and will be officially release a week later on September 20. We haven’t spent a lot of time with the phones yet, but you can read our early impressions of all four phones in our iPhone 16 hands-on review and iPhone 16 Pro & iPhone 16 Pro Max hands-on review.
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