Why Apple not bundling a charger is a good thing

Last week, a rumor started spreading that Apple will stop bundling charger with next iPhone. Many were cursing Apple and many were making fun that we may soon see Apple not bundling the phone itself in future iPhone packages. We think that Apple not bundling charger with iPhone is the right thing to do. Read On!

Bundled charger is…

Total waste, absolute junk. Apple iPhone 11 came with many upgrade and it is the first in many years to come with bigger battery. Cameras are better, display is better, look and feel is better, chipset is faster, you have better storage options, higher amount of RAM. But, it still comes with puny, really pathetic 5W charger in the box. Can you guess how much time it takes for that charger to charge the iPhone 11 from 0% to 100%? It takes up to 4 hours to charge battery.

Yes, in a world where Android phones go from 0-100% in 40 minutes, we have the most advanced phone (self proclaimed by Apple) that charges from 0 to 100% in 4 hours. Now, tell us if you still think Apple should bundle that pathetic pile of trash in every iPhone package? Those who use the fast chargers once will never go back to this junk. So, why package it in first place?

How about bundling a fast charger? Apple’s 18W Fast charger is priced at 29$. If this is bundled with iPhone, Apple will showcase it as innovation and hike iPhone price by 50$ or it could be more. Instead, it is better that buyers get their own charger. After all, things get delivered to home in a day or two.

Better alternatives

For example, Xiaomi 18W fast charger costs 499 INR (7$) and it works really well. I have two of them at home and they just work! I even had Aukey charger that I got for 20$ and it could charge three devices at a time. For 20$, I can get a 20000mAh power bank that can charge phones at 18W power. Also, these power banks can charge two devices at same time. What do you prefer? Pay 50$ more for bundled fast charger package or pay 7$-20$ for 3rd party fast chargers?

There is another problem with bundling useless chargers with phone. In 2019, 53.6 million metric tonnes of eWaste was collected and is up by 21% in 5 years. Avoiding such useless accessories would certainly save reduce a bit of this junk. This will not only reduce junk, it also makes iPhone package lot thinner and this again reduces usage of cardboard/paper/plastic.

So, there is no point in Apple bundling the same 5W junk in every iPhone charger. There is no point in asking for better charger as Apple will hike the pricing showcasing it as ‘reinventing the charger’. Instead, let Apple just sell the phone with bundled charging cable and earpods.