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How to convert any phone to wireless charging

With Mobile World Congress almost upon us and a slew of new phone models incoming as a result, one thing that’s likely to be very big this year is wireless charging – there’s some big news on this front expected that’s pretty revolutionary.

We’re fully expecting most manufacturers to add Qi-standard wireless charging to their flagship phones, including last-gen hold-outs Sony, Samsung and possibly even HTC. All will be revealed over the next couple of days.

In the meantime, however, don’t despair if your current phone doesn’t have a Qi charger on board. You don’t have to upgrade this year – it’s trivial to add the feature to an older model.

What you’ll need for the conversion is a kit containing a desktop charger and a mobile receiver compatible with the Qi standard. The best place to look is BidOrBuy – no high street stores we’ve seen in South Africa have them. Generics are best and you can get both charger and converter for about R500 – just remember that delivery charges can be steep.

A cornucopia of Qi-standard charging tech.
A cornucopia of Qi-standard charging tech.

The receivers are paper-thin stickers, and the best chargers to look for are the disc shaped ones.

Some phones with removable backs – notably those from Samsung – have terminals next to the battery for charging. You can get a paper thin charge receiver that attaches to these and sits under the regular phone back.

For other phones, like the HTC One you’ll need a receiver that has a microUSB connector. To use this, you’ll need to plug the microUSB adaptor into your phone’s charging port, and stick the receiver on the back.

The charging sticker befouling the glorious gunmental HTC One (M8).
The charging sticker befouling the glorious gun-metal HTC One (M8).

Looks foul doesn’t it? Don’t despair! You don’t need direct contact to make wireless charging work. Indeed, back in the 19th century, renowned scientist Nikola Tesla proposed sending electricity over long distances as part of the national grid using very similar principles to the resonance induction chargers that make up the Qi standard.

Qi charging will work through most phone cases and covers, as long as they aren't made of metal.
Qi charging will work through most phone cases and covers, as long as they aren’t made of metal.

For this HTC One (M8), the wireless tag sits neatly under the soft cover that comes with the phone. And it works perfectly.

It works, mother.
It works, mother. See the charging symbol at the top.

All you need to do now is plug the charging disc into a USB cable – it’ll work off a regular USB port – and you’re done. Bear in mind that you won’t benefit from fast charging techniques used to quickly top-up Qualcomm-based phones. To finish off our test, we 3D printed a dock designed to hold a wireless charging disc.

Looks great, doesn’t it? Just drop your phone in and go.

I made this.
I made this.
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