Wi-fi Energy Consortium (WPC) — a corporation that overlooks wi-fi charging requirements — introduced a brand new commonplace known as Qi2. The headline is that the WPC is working with Apple to carry Magsafe-like capabilities to Android.

It’s been over two years since Apple launched MagSafe for iPhones — a wi-fi commonplace that opens up a ton of magnetically attachable equipment together with chargers. The corporate’s main function was to bump up the velocity of wi-fi charging — from 7.5W for Qi-compatible chargers to 15W for MagSafe Chargers. Apple additionally wished to do away with the issue of getting to completely align the telephone with the wi-fi charging pad with magnets that snap to the again of the telephone completely. Nevertheless, the usual continues to be proprietary and the Apple-certified ecosystem of equipment hasn’t grown a lot.

The WPC mentioned that Qi2 permits a Magnetic Energy Profile — constructed on the idea of Apple’s MagSafe expertise. So it’s seemingly that units suitable with the Qi2 commonplace will work will each Android and iOS-based units.

“Qi2’s Magnetic Energy Profile will be certain that telephones or different rechargeable battery-powered cell merchandise are completely aligned with charging units, thus offering improved vitality effectivity and sooner charging,” the WPC mentioned in a press launch.

The consortium mentioned that the brand new Qi2 commonplace shall be launched later this 12 months and can substitute the present Qi commonplace. And Qi2 suitable equipment ought to be obtainable earlier than the top of the 12 months. Notably, it mentioned this new commonplace will pave approach for equipment “that wouldn’t be chargeable utilizing present flat surface-to-flat floor units.” This might be used for charging completely different sorts of headphones or smartwatches.

The WPC hasn’t launched full specs associated to Qi2, so we don’t learn about its capabilities simply but. A WPC spokesperson advised The Verge that whereas initially Qi2 will cap charging speeds at 15W, it plans to work on greater energy profiles for the usual at a later stage.

The Qi2 commonplace would possibly set the stage for a sooner magnet-enabled wi-fi charging expertise, but it surely received’t guarantee the standard of magnets used within the chargers or telephones. So it’s arduous to ensure a safe magnetic match with Qi2-compatible chargers. It’s additionally not clear if chargers with this new commonplace will work completely with iPhone 14 or older fashions. Apple didn’t touch upon the story on the time of writing.

As Apple will undertake USB-C for iPhones attributable to laws within the EU and India, it’d search for one other commonplace to manage. Proper now, wi-fi charging — particularly one thing like MagSafe — is nowhere close to wired charging speeds. By having MagSafe be the bottom for a Qi2-like commonplace that shall be extensively adopted, Apple is perhaps setting the bottom for having iPhones rely extra (and even utterly) on wi-fi charging sooner or later.