I must say, I find the whole “fast charging” craze for electronic high tech devices a bit worrisome. I noticed my last iPhone didn’t keep a charge well, after only about a year. Oftentimes I charged it with my Mac charger, which was supposedly “safe” to do, but the higher wattage probably wasn’t ideal for the battery’s longevity. It also said the battery health was better than it likely really was at 85%, and thus ineligible for a free battery replacement with AppleCare, which requires being at 79% health or below.

Lucky for me, I was able to do a trade-in with Verizon with a free upgrade from the iPhone 15 Pro Max to the iPhone 17 Pro Max. Supposedly the 17 Pro Max has the best smartphone battery of any flagship model right now, whether iOS or Android, from what I read.

So far, I like the new phone and it’s been WAY better! I’m trying to be mindful of good battery habits, like taking the case off, if charging with the MagSafe charger instead of USB-C cable, so the battery’s temp doesn’t get too hot.

I started looking into this whole fast charge bullshit more, and realized slow charging is far better.

Similarly, I follow the 80/20 rule for all of my high-tech devices, including my Garmin smartwatch and Oura ring, by never charging above 80% and never letting it dip below 20%, if possible, as it’s supposedly best for the battery longevity to stay in the middle. Once in a while going above that or to a full charge is OK, and sometimes I’ll forget and charge up to 90% or so, but I try not to. Yes, I have to charge my devices more often this way, but I’d like the battery health to stay good for as long as possible, and most importantly, hold a charge with a slow linear decline (not go from 19% to 17% to then 4%).

Fortunately my new iPhone has an autostop feature above 80% charging, although the Garmin watch and Oura ring do NOT have those features. These devices still charge relatively fast, even with lower wattage USB-C ports on my Mac, so I always keep an eye when charging them, since I want their batteries to last.

Why don’t these device makers have consumer warnings, or built-in features to stop fast charging? I wonder if this will become more of an issue in the coming years, especially with bigger ticket items like EVs… We’ll see.

I found an interesting article on this topic. www.recurrentauto.com/research/… But if you are curious to learn more about batteries, whether personal electronic devices or EVs, I encourage you to do some searching, and maybe ask a few AI chatbots for some source material.