Fast forward to ten years ago: the first iPhones are on the market, various communicators on Windows Mobile and the first Android smartphones. All of them have batteries with a capacity of 1200-1500 mAh and charging at ~ 1 A and 5 V, which made it possible to fully charge the battery in one and a half to two hours. Taking into account the fact that the devices of that time, for the most part, at least quietly survived until the evening, or even lived for more than a day, rarely anyone complained about for a long time charging.

But as time went on, battery capacities began to grow, battery life fell, and charges remained the same: all this eventually led to the fact that you often had to spend hours next to the outlet, just so that the smartphone survived until the evening. And, of course, manufacturers began to solve the problem: since it is impossible to increase the capacity of the batteries even more, then you need to charge them faster - this is how fast charging standards appeared, which we will talk about today.

USB Battery Charging Revision 1.2

The standard was adopted by the USB consortium back in 2011 - that is, it could be used absolutely free of charge by any manufacturer that equipped their device with a USB port. At the same time, if standard USB 3.0 gave out no more than 900 mA at 5 V, then the current increases already to 1.5 A - more than one and a half times, which can significantly reduce the charging time.

In fact, it did not receive particularly wide distribution: often such a powerful USB port was only in top motherboards ah and laptops, and it was usually marked in red or with a lightning icon:

Alas, smartphone manufacturers still continued to put chargers for 1 A and 5 V in the kit, that is, chargers with Battery Charging 1.2 had to be bought separately. But, in any case, this made it possible to charge devices significantly faster without harm to them.

Qualcomm Quick Charge 1.0-2.0

Perhaps the most famous fast charging standard, announced by Qualcomm in 2013. Version 1.0 only supported the Snapdragon 600 chipset. The voltage still remained standard for USB - 5 volts, but the current was raised to 2 A - that is, another third more than that of BC 1.2. The first version of this standard did not receive special distribution, so there is no point in dwelling on it for a long time.

QC 2.0 was the first really popular fast charging standard. He worked with devices on Snapdragon 200, 208, 210, 212, 400, 410, 412, 415, 425, 610, 615, 616, 800, 801, 805, 808 and 810. The main difference from previous standards is that the current stopped growing, which is now limited to 2 A, but the voltage can rise as much as 12 V. The reason for this is banal: the vast majority of the USB-microUSB cables that existed at that time supported a current of no more than 2.4 A, otherwise they could start to overheat, which was already dangerous ( as we know, heat loss is proportional to the current strength and the square of the resistance). Therefore, Qualcomm went the other way - they simply began to raise the voltage, and as a result, the maximum power is now 18 W (12 V and 1.67 A) versus 10 W (5 V and 2 A) for the first version of QC.


Of course, special controllers were now used to regulate the voltage, which should have been both in charging and in the smartphone itself. They “communicated” with each other using the D + / D- contacts in the USB port, and the smartphone chose the required voltage and current strength. If the charger did not support QC (that is, it did not respond to a special voltage on the D + / D- contacts), then charging was carried out with a standard current of 1 A at a voltage of 5 V.

Alas, with the release of QC 2.0, the first problems began to arise: due to the rather high power of 18 W, the batteries began to overheat, which negatively affected their life. Of course, the standard included a safe temperature range, at the exit of which fast charging turned off, but manufacturers often turned a blind eye to this so that marketers could please users with slogans like “80% per hour”.

Things got even worse with the release of the hot Snapdragon 810: taking into account the fact that when Android is connected to charging, it often increases background activity (for example, programs are updated), which warms up the CPU, plus the battery heats up from fast charging - as a result, users massively encountered rapid degradation of batteries and dying of motherboards from overheating. This happened especially often with the owners of LG G4, Nexus 5x and Flex. The company, in response to complaints, recommended using fast charging only when it is needed, and charging with a regular slow one at night - it is obvious that users did not appreciate this answer and filed a class action lawsuit against LG.

Qualcomm itself does not name the charging time - it just says that it is now 75% faster than with QC 1.0. Independent tests show that a smartphone with a battery of ~ 3000 mAh can be charged using QC 2.0 by 50% in about 40 minutes.

USB power delivery

In 2015, devices with USB-C began to appear en masse. Since this protocol can contain many different others, manufacturers often began to stop at USB 2.0 or 3.0 - respectively, there were no problems with QC 2.0 support.

But then it became more interesting - the USB consortium creates the Type-C 1.2 standard, which supports a current of 3 A at a voltage of 5 V: for example, the Lumia 950 and 950XL smartphones had such fast charging. It would seem that everything is great, there should be no problems with QC: but no, such cables have a special control microcircuit inside that can only work at 5 V, and QC 2.0, as we remember, can raise the voltage up to 12 V. And since there is no check in the QC standard for the presence of such a chip in the cable, all this can end sadly for both the cable and the smartphone.

Of course, Google could not stand aside, and officially recommended that smartphone manufacturers refuse to use USB-C along with QC 2.0. However, as expected, many manufacturers (for example, OnePlus) assured users that there would be no problems with their cables, but if your smartphone burned out from using a third-party cable, this, as they say, is already your problem.

Further - even "fun": in order to distinguish between cables that can pass 3 A, 1.5 A and 1 A, the USB consortium decided to build resistors of 10, 22 and 56 kOhm into them, respectively. But the Chinese, as usual, decided to put only 10 kOhm resistors in cheap cables - this led to the fact that devices with USB-C 1.2 support “understand” that 3 A can be taken and ask them from the charger. The result here can be absolutely anything - at best, charging will give the current that it can (and it is unlikely to be 3 A), and at worst, it will simply burn out, possibly damaging the connected smartphone as well.

Toward the end of 2015, the USB consortium is releasing the specifications for the Power Delivery 3.0 standard, which in the future is likely to be used by everyone: for example, it allows you to set the voltage from 5 to 20 V and the current from 1.8 to 5 A, so in the end the maximum power can reach as much as 100 watts - this is already enough to charge a laptop, and many modern solutions such as Xiaomi Notebook or Apple MacBook already using it. At the same time, the type of connector can be anything: USB-C, microUSB, even USB-A, and the transfer can go both ways: that is, you can charge a smartphone from a smartphone. At the same time, there is backward compatibility with USB-C 1.2, that is, you can charge the same Lumia 950 from charging with PD support. All possible combinations of charges are available below:

Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0-4.0

Of course, the company understood that overheating problems needed to be addressed, and in 2016, with the release of Snapdragon 820/821, QC 3.0 technology was introduced. Qualcomm stopped chasing power - it still remained within 18 W, but now there was a flexible voltage setting: if 5, 9 or 12 V were hard-coded in version 2.0, then it was possible to change the voltage in steps of 0.2 V in the range of 3.6 -20 V. In addition, smartphone manufacturers themselves could now limit the maximum voltage, for example, at 12 V. Plus, the new Snapdragon (821, 820, 620, 618, 617 and 430 are supported) were still colder than the failed 810 oh, in the end, we can assume that the problem with overheating has been solved.

Alas, another problem with USB-C still remained, so using third-party cables for fast charging through this port was still risky. As for charging speed, the company promises that most smartphones with QC 3.0 will charge up to 70% in half an hour:

The QC 4.0 standard was introduced at the end of 2016 and solved many problems: firstly, now it could be used with any USB-C cables - of course, the charging speed will depend on them, but still it will go faster anyway, than with standard 1 A and 5 V. Its second feature is full compatibility with Power Delivery, so first charging asks the connected device if it supports PD, and if not, it switches to QC mode.

The specifications of the QC 4.0 standard are the same as those of the 3.0 - up to 18W at current up to 2A and voltage up to 12V, and up to 27W through the PD standard. Supported chipsets are Snapdragon 630, 636, 835. According to Qualcomm, new technology allows you to recharge a device with a 2750 mAh battery for 5 hours of use in just 5 minutes, and charge the battery from zero to 50% in 15 minutes.

QC 4+ technology, introduced in 2017, does not differ much from 4.0: for example, Dual Charge technology allows you to split the current into two streams, which reduces the temperature by 3 degrees and increases the charging speed by 15%. Supported chipsets are Snapdragon 660, 670, 710, and 845.

The general table of all QC versions looks like this:

backward compatibility

All versions of QC, starting from 2.0, are backward compatible: so, if the phone has more than new version QC than charging, it will use a protocol that supports charging, but with the energy efficiency of the version that is used in the phone. If you connect a smartphone with more old version QC to charge with a newer one, then the effect will be completely similar to using charging with the same QC version that the device supports.

Power Delivery compatible with Quick Charge 2.0 and 3.0

As I wrote above, it doesn’t officially exist, but in practice various options are possible: for example, there are smartphones, such as the Nexus 5x or 6p, that support both PD and QC - they will charge quickly in both cases. The second option is that the charger and the gadget will not “understand” each other, and standard slow charging with 1 A and 5 V will go on, or charging will not go at all. But there may be the worst option: a device without PD support will be supplied with 3 A and 5 V (USB-C 1.2 standard) due to the “wrong” cable with a 10 kΩ resistor, and here the situation will already be unpredictable: the QC standard with such does not work with currents, that is, the smartphone may simply burn out, or it may simply refuse to charge. Therefore, if your device supports QC 2.0 or 3.0, choose both the cable and the charger very carefully.

In the final part of the article, we will talk about fast chargers from other manufacturers such as Apple, Huawei, Mediatek and others.

Even if you are often near the outlet, a smartphone that has sat down at the wrong time can create many uncomfortable moments. What to do if it's time to go out, but the battery has not had time to charge? Or when you forgot to put your gadgets on charge in the evening, and in the morning they greet us with alarming discharge signs? Of course, you can always use external battery, but it also needs to be recharged. And it usually takes so long to charge...

Manufacturers of batteries and gadgets are well aware of this problem - and successfully solve it with the help of "fast" charging technologies. Let's take a brief look at modern technologies fast charging, especially since in 2017 they continue to develop rapidly. At MWC 2017, Meizu introduced the fourth generation of its fast charging technology, Super mCharge.

Super mCharge

Super mCharge technology allows you to fully charge a smartphone with a 3000 mAh battery in just 20 minutes. How fast is it? Equipped with this technology, the Meizu prototype was 11 times faster than iPhone charging 7 Plus and turned out to be 3.6 times faster Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge. Still, in 5 minutes you can charge the gadget by 30%!

To achieve this result, a high-voltage direct charge (HVDC) method is used. The Super mCharge power adapter delivers 11V at 5A. This means that the maximum transmitted power reaches an impressive 55 watts. Ordinary charging cable it cannot transmit such power - so to use Super mCharge, you will need not only a smartphone and an adapter that supports this technology, but also a separate high-power cable.

A separate plus is that the heating temperature of the battery case with such a "turbo charge" according to Meizu's promises will not exceed 39 °, which will allow you to comfortably work with your smartphone, even while charging from the mains.

Quick charge

For several years now, Qualcomm has been releasing chips that are compatible with its proprietary Quick Charge technology. Its support is provided either by using a separate chip in the system, or by a compatible Snapdragon chip. For this reason, Quick Charge technology is supported not only Android smartphones with a Snapdragon chip, but also separate external batteries - in particular models from Xiaomi.

In 2018, the fourth generation of Quick Charge 4.0 appeared, compatible with the USB Power Delivery (USB-PD) protocol via USB port Type-C. But previous versions of Quick Charge do not lose their relevance - they can reduce battery charge time by up to 75%. Due to the popularity of Snapdragon chips, support for this technology can be found in many flagships from various brands. Quick Charge 3.0 technology is backwards compatible with the previous ones - so if your gadget supports Quick Charge 2.0, a charger with the third version will work for it.

Quick Charge adapters provide faster device charging by allowing the device to receive more voltage and current strength. If you connect Quick Charge charging to an old device, nothing bad will happen, but the gadget will charge at the same pace. As with Super mCharge, fast charging requires not only the support of the technology on your gadget, but also the appropriate charger. You can use a regular cable - and you can quickly charge not only a smartphone, but also an external battery!

Super Charge, Turbo Charge, Pump Express, RapidCharge, FastCharge, VOOC Flash Charging

Each manufacturer strives to implement its own version of fast charging for their devices. Alas, in anticipation of the technologies of "nano" or "graphene" batteries promised to us by scientists (which, in theory, can be charged instantly), all current solutions are made according to a single technical solution– increase in throughput power and current strength.

As an example alternative solution we can mention OPPO with its proprietary VOOC Flash Charging technology. Thanks to the eight-pin battery, each of the internal cells is charged in parallel, with a current of 4.5 amperes and a voltage of 5 volts.

Pump Express works similarly to Quick Charge, but with MTK processors, and Huawei's Super Charge boasts records for high-speed charging (but only in its flagship devices).

Instead of conclusions

When choosing fast charging technologies, ask which ones your gadget supports. And if you have an iPhone or your smartphone does not support any of them, it doesn’t matter, just choose the right external battery with fast charge support, supplement it with the one you need network adapter and you will definitely not be left without communication at the most inopportune moment. And if you already have an external battery, pick up a charger that supports a charge current of 2.1A, so your iPhone will charge faster.

Aukey Wall Charger is a charger that will allow you to recharge the batteries of all your devices in one place. 4 USB outputs will provide simultaneous charging of four devices. This charger is suitable for both home use and travel, because it has a compact size and foldable design.

• fast charging
• Built-in fuse
• Four ports
• Universal memory

• connector for USB-C connections
• Quick Charge 3.0 technology
• 5 ports
• Works from the network

• Compactness and high performance;
• Led indicator charge;
• Qualcomm Quick Charge Technology

• Protection against overheating, overvoltage and short circuit
• Three USB output connectors
• Wide input voltage range
• Informative display

• Charge current: 7.2A;
• Total power: 36W;
• Integrated network filter