Anker has been known for many of their batteries and cables that they sell, and now they are looking to make their battery packs even more popular. They introduced the PowerCore II 10000 at Mobile World Congress this week, which is their second-generation of the PowerCore battery pack, and the bigger news is the new charging chip that is inside this battery. It’s called PowerIQ 2.0, and it’s just one chip this time instead of multiple chips. Anker has said that allowing one chip to do all the work means faster charging, but also thinner and lighter battery packs. Which is evident by looking at the PowerCore II 10000, which is a pretty thin battery pack.
This battery pack does not feature any of Qualcomm’s Quick Charging but it does have their own PowerIQ charging which adapts to your device to give it as much power as it can take. Which is definitely nice, allowing you to charge your smartphone quickly, but not so quickly that it causes damage to the device. There’s only one USB-A port available here, so unfortunately your friends will have to wait or get their own battery pack. Additionally, the input is through micro USB still, and not a USB-C connector, something that many people have been hoping for, especially with most smartphones moving over to the USB-C standard these days.
Anker is planning to launch the PowerCore II 10000 in May of this year, and they will be selling it for about $29.99. That’s pretty comparative to their current PowerCore 10000 battery packs that they are selling right now. The majority of them sell for around $25-40 depending on the model (some have Quick Charge 3.0 and therefore cost a bit more). This one is a bit longer than some of the other 10,000mAh batteries out there, but it is much thinner than they are, allowing you to keep it in your pocket without it pulling down your pants. With a 10,000mAh capacity, this means that you’ll be able to charge your phone around three times before needing to recharge the battery itself. Of course, this all depends on what you’re charging, with most smartphones being around 3000mAh these days, that’s a pretty good number.
