Expect more phones and tablets to ship with wireless charging capabilities soon: Qualcomm has announced that a breakthrough in its existing WiPower wireless charging technology will allow it to charge phones that have metal exteriors.
Until now, wireless charging has been limited to phones and tablets that aren’t made out of metal thanks to technical issues to do with how metal affects the charging field.
Qualcomm’s WiPower technology, which is compatible with the Rezence wireless charging standard, has been fairly tolerant of metal objects placed near or in the charging field such as keys and coins, but now Qualcomm says the phones and tablets themselves can be made of metal and still charge.
“Building a wireless charging solution into devices with metal exteriors is a significant step for moving the entire industry forward,” said Steve Pazol, general manager of wireless charging at Qualcomm Incorporated.
“Today, more device manufacturers are choosing to utilise metal alloys in their product designs to provide greater structural support and, of course, aesthetics. QTIs engineering advancement eliminates a major obstacle facing wireless power and opens up the continued adoption of this desirable feature to a much wider range of consumer electronics and use cases.”
Qualcomm also put out a video to explain the feature in more detail:
With that in mind, it’s not unreasonable to expect the big names to include wireless charging capabilities in more of their phones and shout about the technology’s convenience from the rooftops in the coming months.
Normally we’d object to such obnoxious behaviour, but we’re pretty excited about wireless charging becoming a regular feature of just about every phone around, and will be more than happy to add our voices to the growing chorus singing its praises.
