Motorola and Xiaomi focus on contactless wireless charging

Two new concepts from Xiaomi and Motorola show us the smartphone charging of the future: cordless and contactless.

It's called Mi Air Charge and it's the new and innovative wireless charging system from Xiaomi. It's not yet a product and you can't buy it, but it's a concept shown by the Chinese company that, if it were to go into production could revolutionize not only the way smartphones are used, but also built.

The recharge, in fact, is a crucial issue for the future of smartphones: users want more and more power but also more and more autonomy and combine the two aspects in a single product that is lightweight, beautiful, ergonomic, not too big and, perhaps, with innovative form factors such as those of foldable or rollable smartphones is a real hell for designers and engineers. La soluzione, quindi, potrebbe essere non tanto dotare gli smartphone di batterie più grandi, ma di batterie che si ricaricano più in fretta. O, come nel caso di Xiaomi Mi Air Charge, che si ricaricano in continuazione.

Xiaomi Mi Air Charge: come funziona

Xiaomi non ha pubblicato alcun dettaglio tecnico sulla tecnologia Mi Air Charge, definita “Remote charging“. Ha pubblicato però un video, in cui mostra come potrebbe funzionare. Si tratta di un grosso parallelepipedo da posizionare in una stanza, connesso all’energia elettrica.

Il parallelepipedo è un caricatore wireless, che “manda energia" nella stanza se rileva dispositivi da ricaricare. Finché lo smartphone è nel raggio di azione del caricatore Mi Air Charge riceve energia e si ricarica. A definite step up from current wireless charging technologies, which require contact between the device to be charged and the charging mat.

Motorola's response

It's not just Xiaomi working on similar technology: Motorola has also just shown a video illustrating the operation of a device similar to the Mi Air Charge, not so much in design but in basic concept.

Motorola's contactless wireless charging station is much smaller, goes on a table and has a range of 100 cm. It also requires that there be nothing between the charger and the smartphone to be charged, or else the charging will stop.

What lies ahead

If technologies like those from Xiaomi and Motorola were to become products and spread into our homes and offices, then smartphones could change completely. No longer would you need a big battery to get through the night, because charging would be continuous.

What Xiaomi and Motorola have shown, then, makes even Apple's MagSafe technology and the wireless charging of iPhones 12 obsolete. But just like Apple's technology, Xiaomi and Motorola's could pose a danger to those with pacemakers or other biomedical devices.