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Fastest Way to Charge iPhone 12 – Wired or MagSafe?

Your iPhone 12 or 13 is definitely going to charge faster if you plug the USB-C to Lightning cable that comes with your phone into Apple’s 20-watt power adapter.

But if you place your phone on an Apple MagSafe wireless charger and plug the wireless charger into into the same 20-watt power adapter, your iPhone will charge almost as fast.

I wanted to see for myself exactly how these two charging methods stacked up against each. So I drained my iPhone 12 Pro battery to 1%, then charged it back up to 50% using both the wired and wireless methods.

Charging test method

I put my phone in Airplane Mode and closed all of my open apps. My phone has an Apple MagSafe silicone case which I left on for both tests.

For the wired test, I plugged my iPhone 12 directly into the Apple 20-watt power adapter. Then I let my phone drain back down to 1% and used the Apple MagSafe wireless adapter.

I let the battery drain to 1% rather than zero because I wanted to take screenshots of the battery power levels. I did not turn off my phone for the same reason.

I charged my iPhone back to 50% with both charging methods and recorded the results. I would have charged them to 100%, but I was too impatient to wait that long.

Charging test results

WIRED

MAGSAFE WIRELESS

Charging power output

20 watts

15 watts

Apple 20-watt power adapter

iPhone 12 Pro

Apple MagSafe silicone case

Charging method

Apple USB-C to Lightning cable

Apple MagSafe wireless charger

Time to 50% charge

27 minutes

43 minutes

Fastest charge to 50%

38% slower

Wired charge to 50%

It took 27 minutes to charge my iPhone 12 Pro from 1% to 50% using a wired connection.

screenshot of wired charging test start
Wired charging test – Start
Charging test wired end
Wired charging test – End

MagSafe wireless charge to 50%

It took 43 minutes to charge my iPhone 12 Pro from 1% using a MagSafe wireless connection.

Wireless charging test screenshot start
Wireless charging test – Start
screenshot of wireless charging test end
Wireless charging test – End

MagSafe charging is about 38% slower than plugging your phone in directly. But unless you’re in a screaming hurry, MagSafe charging is a heck of a lot more convenient and easy to use.

What does Apple recommend for fast charging?

Source: Apple.com

Kim is an expert in innovative wallets and MagSafe accessories. He has reviewed close to 100 different wallets and has over 750,000 video views on his Wallet Surfer YouTube channel. If you want to send Kim a quick message, then visit his contact page.

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