How many times have you said “why is my phone/tablet taking forever to charge?” I know I’ve said it a ton of times. Especially when it’s an extended battery. Not to long ago, Qualcomm detailed Quick Charge 1.0 which was on 70 different devices last year. Quick Charge is an in-device solution that enables devices to charge up to 40% faster. Today, Qualcomm is introducing the next generation of Quick Charge. It’s Quick Charge 2.0.
What’s different about Quick Charge 2.0 is that it is available in-device and in the AC/DC wall charger. It’s also much faster and even more flexible than version 1.0 was. It will also be inside smartphones and tablets which are powered by the Snapdragon 800 processors, which we’ve yet to see in a device. Supposedly, devices with Quick Charge 2.0 can charge 75% faster than those without Quick Charge. Now that’s a huge different. Qualcomm says that in their labs, they’ve found tablets that normally take over 7 hours to charge were able to be full charged in less than 3 hours using Quick Charge 2.0. Not that’s some good news.
Quick Charge 2.0 is backwards-compatible. So that you’ll be able to use a Quick Charge 2.0 device with a Quick Charge 1.0 charger, and vice versa. Quick Charge 2.0 will also soon be built into standard micro-USB AC/DC wall chargers, so these chargers won’t look or operate differently and should be widely available. Qualcomm has said that they are already working with leading AC/DC chipset suppliers and their AC/DC power supply partners to fully enable the power supply ecosystem, which is great news for consumers.
We’re always talking about how we need innovation with batteries and charging, instead of bigger and better processors and more pixels in our displays. Well it looks like Qualcomm listened. While it’s not quite better battery technology, it is better charging technology which is a start. How many of you are excited about Quick Charge 2.0? I know I’m excited and can’t wait to see what devices will be powered by the Snapdragon 800 processors.