It’s not uncommon for some third party chargers to heat up devices when charging. I use MBP 140 W Apple charger for my iPad Pro when I travel few times a month. It doesn’t heat the iPad. On occasion I have used MBA charger my family uses. Your best bet is probably MBA charger if you think 65 W is too heavy. Can you return the Ugreen charger?
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
iPad iPad gets hot charging at 65W, not 20W
- Thread starter WallySpoons
- Start date
-
- Tags
- charging
- Sort by reaction score
Tolerances are a totally different thing. Tolerances set the level you must not overtake otherwise the battery will be damaged.
heat is detrimental to battery chemicals. Any heat. Period.
And silicon tolerances has nothing to do with that.
Which is precisely what Apple algorithms consider. iPhone shuts down long before those tolerances are breached. Put the phone continuously in sauna for 30 mins, it will shut down and warn you of high temperature. Both extremes are foolish, I will never take my phone to sauna or I will keep it after iPhone shuts down. As some one who replaces iPhones every 7 years, I know how batteries deteriorate when it’s time. Battery deteriotion is not linear, few days from now my battery could drastically discharge. I always budget a battery replacement for my iPhone or iPad Pro. The most battery concerns here are paranoia than actual data. By that logic heat can damage anything.
Yes. From 25%.
My instinct is to stick with the Apple stuff TBH. Someone higher up the thread made the point that the (admittedly exorbitant) cost of a branded Apple charger is small relative to the cost of the device it's charging.
There was a definite temperature difference.
Thanks everyone for engaging!
You still seem not to understand the matter. The shut down protection is to avoid “physical damage” to the phone, not degradation.
Degradation happens over months due to the temperature and usage.
You are speaking about two different things.
Former Genius Bar specialist here. It’s normal for an iPad (or any device) to get warm while charging at a higher rate, especially if you’re using it at the same time or if it’s in a case that traps heat.
It depends on your definition of ‘hot.’ In my experience(which is going to be drastically different per store location), most devices brought to the Genius Bar for being ‘too hot’ were warm at worst. They were almost never presenting an issue.
However, if it becomes uncomfortable to hold, smells like something is burning or baking, or the heat is concentrated near one specific area (like the charging port), that could indicate an issue to contact Apple over.
I don’t know how much help they will be if it doesn’t flag a failure in their tests but still gets too hot, I quit for a reason 😅
It depends on your definition of ‘hot.’ In my experience(which is going to be drastically different per store location), most devices brought to the Genius Bar for being ‘too hot’ were warm at worst. They were almost never presenting an issue.
However, if it becomes uncomfortable to hold, smells like something is burning or baking, or the heat is concentrated near one specific area (like the charging port), that could indicate an issue to contact Apple over.
I don’t know how much help they will be if it doesn’t flag a failure in their tests but still gets too hot, I quit for a reason 😅
Yes. My iPad 12.9 M2 always gets hot while charging with my 70 W Macbook charging brick. It does dim and slow down, but that is the only way it charges under 3 hours. It has over 500 cycles at 79% health, so I am not taking care of my iPad’s battery anymore.
Over 500 cycles on an M2 is quite a lot: I have 540 but mine is an M1, one year older. I’m not surprised battery health is so low on your…
I don’t trust or use third party chargers. I use the official Apple charger for my iPad. I think a third party charger may destroy the battery 🔋.
Charging voltage and current is negotiated between the device and charger upon connection and throughout charging. If Apple is following USB standards there should be no reason why third party chargers that also adhere to standards would lead to any harm of the device being charged. This thread is full of subjective opinion about the potential performance of OP's charger but no real measure of charging voltage/current or true temperature measurements.
Sticking to a device manufacturer's own chargers is a safe thing to do for sure but lumping all third party chargers as suspect is unfair to the manufacturers who stick to standards with what they produce.
There are inexpensive inline power meters that can be used to check charging voltage and current for USB devices (less than $20) for those interested in comparing charging characteristics between different chargers and cables that they may own.
Sticking to a device manufacturer's own chargers is a safe thing to do for sure but lumping all third party chargers as suspect is unfair to the manufacturers who stick to standards with what they produce.
There are inexpensive inline power meters that can be used to check charging voltage and current for USB devices (less than $20) for those interested in comparing charging characteristics between different chargers and cables that they may own.
There are several third party charger of higher quality than Apple.
Definitely this, GaN chargers from Ugreen, Belkin, Morphie, Anker etc are generally better than the equivalent Apple charger because they use Gallium Nitride technology. Smaller, more ports, better build quality and cleaner, more efficient charging than the older Silicon chargers Apple currently offer.
At the moment Apple have only upgraded their 70 and 140 watt chargers to GaN tech, they need to do the same to all their chargers especially the 35 watt dual port charger.
Last edited:
I recently bought the Anker 735 Nano II 65W, for almost half the price of Apple’s dual port… GaN II technology and 3 ports available (2 USB C and 1 USB A).
I have a few of those 735's and they're great for travel, my family and I love them. Compact and with enough power for overnight charging an iPad, iPhone and Apple Watch simultaneously. If I travel with a laptop I step up to my 747 150W charger instead.
Same. Circuitry and quality control are involved, so my iPad Pro and iPhone only get connected to Apple cables and chargers or my Mac. Besides, I'm careful with my stuff, so I never need to buy new chargers or cables. I also trust their provenance, as I only purchase them from Apple or a brick and mortar authorized retailer.
Add: Since I got the M4 Mac mini with the handy ports on the front, I've been using it to charge my iPad Pro (USB-C) and iPhone (Lightning), so no more fast charging for me, unless I travel with the Apple 35w dual charger.
Last edited:
But the Apple dual port connects to the extension cords that many of us have from our older MacBooks, which is a handy way to bring the ports up onto the table where shorter Apple cables we already have can be used.
In your specific user scenario it could makes sense, but it still is lower quality compared to cheaper alternatives like my Anker.
That said, GaN bricks only mean the *BRICK* is cooler at those higher charge rates. The quality of the brick is irrelevant to the iPad itself. If the iPad is receiving 65W, it will charge at 65W, and have to dissipate some of that extra energy as heat. At 20W, less of it gets turned to heat.
Heat generated in the device is related to the amperage of the power coming in. Total watts are equal to voltage times amperage.
The USB Power Delivery spec has a few specific voltages that can be offered. The voltages vary based on the total power draw (Watts) requested. From old-fashioned 5 Volts, 1 Amp the same as the old USB-A iPhone bricks all the way up to 20 Volts for basically anything above 45 Watts (all the way to 200 Watts - or 10 Amps at 20 Volts.)
This means that a 20W brick is (based on USB-PD) providing 9 Volts at 2.22 Amps; while a 65W brick is providing 20 Volts at 3.25 Amps.
3.25 Amps is higher than 2.22 Amps, so a system drawing 3.25 Amps will generate more waste heat than a system drawing 2.22 Amps.
Then add in that charging a Lithium Ion cell at higher power rates tends to also be less efficient, generating more waste heat separate from the raw Amperage issue. (Specifically, the higher the "C rate" of charging, the more waste heat is generated. The M2 12" iPad has an ~40 Watt-hour battery pack, charging at higher than 40 Watts will generate quite a bit more waste heat.)
Hence why the iPad gets hotter charging at 65W than 20W.
(Note that this also means that if you want to charge your iPad more *efficiently*, you would want to charge it at a middle-rate, something where it is using a higher voltage, but a lower amperage. 15W or 27W are the two that are on the "minimum amperage at a new voltage tier" of USB-PD spec.)
Based on recent recalls, several Anker devices might be handy to have around if one needs to start a campfire but forgot the matches. Hard to argue with quality like that.
You are speaking about power banks, and one lithium based speaker, not chargers.
A product recall is an indication of a good company. There are power banks recalled from every company.
It doesn’t change the fact that those Anker charger are better than Apple.
Has anyone actually measured the charging voltage and amperage of a 65W GAN charger connected to an iPad at 20V and 3.25 amps? I don't have an iPad Pro to test myself, just my iPad Mini 7.
I ask because this post can be construed by some as factual and yet it may not be true for all chargers. Early information that I had seen about M4 iPad Pro models talked about the those iPads capping out at a max charging rate of about 40W.
I know for my own usage that I am comfortable with using my third party chargers with my devices because I have actually observed the charging rates using an inline meter.
Last edited: