This could be the dumbest iPhone feature ever | ZDNet

The boilers have been stoked on the iPhone 13 rumor machine and barely a day goes by when we don’t get some new rumor or tidbit. Some are interesting, many are not, and some are just plain wild.

This one is wild.

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A video from Max Weinbach of EverythingApplePro goes into some detail as to what to expect from the upcoming iPhone 13. And one of those new features is a larger wireless charging coil which, according to Weinbach, could either see better heat dissipation or even higher charging power.

I’m OK with these.

It was also suggested it could be used for reverse charging.

This is dumb.

For those who don’t know, reverse charging is where a smartphone can be used as a wireless charger for other devices.

You’re basically using your smartphone as a power bank in an inefficient way due to the losses associated with wireless charging.

Some smartphones do have this feature, but beyond the rather muted excitement at being able to do this, I’ve never used this feature.

Why?

Because rarely does my smartphone have enough power for itself, let alone powering other things.

Many were expecting reverse charging to be on the iPhone 12; a filing that Apple made to the FCC that mentioned the feature. The filing did go on, rather cryptically, to say “currently the only accessory that can be charged by iPhones is an external potential apple accessory in the future.”

AirPods, perhaps?

The AirPods Pro case contains a 519mAh battery, a little over five times the capacity of the iPhone 12. Seems like a lot of tech to build into an iPhone to do that when a cable would work just as well.

I’m also unclear about the logistics of how this works?

Do you keep them together in your pocket? Or stack them, and charge the iPhone with a cable?

That’s a lot of tech that Apple needs to put in an iPhone, but also rather inelegant.

That said, Apple is the company that bought us a wireless mouse with a charging port on the underside, so, who knows what’s possible.

Let me know what you think in the comments below.