Test of the vivo 50W Wireless Flash Charger

The "charging wars" for smartphones are mostly waged on the wired front, where some companies have already passed the 100W threshold, allowing you to fully charge your phone from zero to one hundred percent in about or even less than 20 minutes. But occasionally the conflict spills over to the wireless front, where manufacturers are now achieving speeds that were unimaginable a few years ago.

One such device is the 50W wireless charging capable vivo X80 Pro, which we just evaluated. The main drawback is that a specialised wireless charging stand is required. One such charger, the 50W Wireless Flash Charger from vivo, was just delivered to our office, and we are now prepared to repo on what it is capable of.

The vivo X80 Pro has a dual-cell battery with two charge pumps, an industry-standard design found in today's majority of new flagship phones, to achieve lightning-fast charging times. The X80 Pro completed our in-house battery endurance test after only 79 hours with its 4,700mAh total capacity of battery cells. An 80W FlashCharge adapter (20V / 4A) and associated USB-C cable are included with each X80 Pro unit. In our test using a wired charger, we were able to get peak charging power of 65–66W at 17V and 4A, which resulted in a full charge time of 39 minutes.

A complete charge should take 50 minutes, or just 11 minutes more than the 80W wired FlashCharge solution, according to vivo, who says that the 50W Wireless Flash Charger can charge the X80 Pro to 50% in 23 minutes. You shouldn't anticipate 50W electricity blasting the phone constantly since the company clearly states that the real charging power is "dynamically adjusted" and "subject to actual use."

Most gadgets that accept Qi wireless charging are capable of charging at speeds of up to 15W. To achieve the 50W wireless charging speeds, you'll need to utilise a vivo or iOOO charger that supports 66W (or higher) FlashCharge and a suitable USB cable.

A brief introduction to the 50W Wireless FlashCharge charger The dual-coil design allows you to position your phone in either a portrait or a landscape mode, the latter of which is helpful if you want to view a video while it's charging. The cradle has a 60-degree tilt and a 3,600 RPM cooling fan integrated right into the base.

The charging pad has a white and silver appearance and is manufactured entirely of plastic. The charging cradle area has a glossy surface, while the back has a frosted finish. A frosted translucent portion up front holds the object you are charging. On phones that are compatible, Vivo is introducing a special overnight charging mode where the fan will restrict itself to 27Db so that your sleep is not disturbed. Although it won't be as quick, it won't really matter if you are overnighting your phone.

There is a USB-C connector on the charger's rear, allowing you to replace cords without risk. Speaking of cords, it's a little disappointing that the charger's $40 street price (now reduced to $40) was not accompanied with a cable or power converter in the retail package.

If you're travelling and want to bring your 50W FlashCharge charger and use its maximum power, note that you'll be carrying nearly 350 grammes worth of equipment, not including the phone itself. The wireless charger weighs in at 196 grammes, while the X80 Pro's 80W bundled charger and cable come in at an additional 150 grammes.

There is a USB-C connector on the charger's rear, allowing you to replace cords without risk. Speaking of cords, it's a little disappointing that the charger's $40 street price (now reduced to $40) was not accompanied with a cable or power converter in the retail package.

We also tested the vivo X70 Pro+ from a year ago, which was the first device to allow 50W wireless FlashCharge charging. It finished the entire charge in 70 minutes, which is 23 minutes and 7 minutes longer than the iQOO 9 Pro and the more recent vivo X80 Pro, respectively. The fact that vivo has made all of these breakthroughs in only one generation of flagship devices while using a smaller 4,500 mAh battery is impressive.

What can we learn from this small experiment, then? In terms of speed, wireless charging is rapidly catching up to wired options. With all the many proprietary chargers and power connections that only function with a small number of handsets from a single manufacturer, there are, unfortunately, some obstacles to entry. Here is a summary of our results in the form of a chart, along with a comparison of the charging times for an iPhone 12 Pro and MagSafe.

Therefore, even though your brand-new flagship supports 50W wireless charging, you'll still need to spend extra money on a specific wireless charger to use that functionality, and it needs to be coupled with the appropriate cable and plug in order to function.

In the end, having a phone that can fully charge its battery in under 50 minutes without a plug is a pretty impressive feat, and we can only hope that other brands incorporate similar technology into their products in the future. In order to avoid a situation similar to wired charging, where you have to choose between speed and compatibility when choosing your chargers, we also expect that manufacturers will try to converge their wireless fast charging solutions.