Can I Use a Different Power Adapter To Charge My iPhone, iPad or MacBook?

Hi, this is Gary with MacMost.com.  Do you need to use the exact charger that came with your MacBook, iPhone, or iPad or can you use another? 

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Now sometimes I've been asked about chargers for your battery powered Apple products like MacBooks, iPhones, and iPads. Now with iPhones you no longer get a charger in the box, but there is an official one you can buy from Apple. With the MacBooks you get one with the MacBook. Do you need to use that exact charger to charge your product or can you use another Apple charger or a completely different charger from a third party company?  

So basically all Apple products now charge using USB chargers. So you get a USB charger with a MacBook, for instance. You buy USB chargers from Apple to charge you iPhone and other Apple products. The charger itself has a USB port, usually a USB-C now, on it. Older Mac chargers have either USB-C or the rectangular USB-A port on them. So the basic answer to the question can you use any charger for any product is, more or less, Yes. You can. You can use a third party one. You can use an Apple one that is not the same that came with your device. You can use one the provides more or less power with just about any device. So different chargers provide different amounts of power. 

Usually this is measured in watts, but not always. But Apple uses watts. So, for instance, you can get a 35 watt charger from Apple, there is a 20 watt charger. A MacBook may come with something much larger like a 90 watt charger. This is more or less a measure of power to your device. Watts, amps, and volts are all related in a ratio. But volts is always 5 volts for USB devices unless you're talking about Quick Charge which I'll talk about in a few minutes. 

So if your MacBook came with, say, a 60 watt charger you can use a USB charger that is more than 60 watts or less than 60 watts. But if you use something that is less it's going to affect the charged speed. So, for instance, if you use a 20 watt charger on a MacBook that comes with a 60 watt charger you may notice it charges slower than using the 60 watt charger. If you go really, really low, like you use a USB charger from a small gadget that is even less than, say, 5 watts then you may notice that it's just not enough to charge your MacBook at all. 

If you go up in wattage, though, it won't damage your MacBook. Think of it like your MacBook pulls power from the device. So say if you use a 120 watt charger and your MacBook really only accepts up to 60 watts it's only going to pull 60 watts from that charger. The charger is not going to overload or overheat your MacBook. 

Another thing to think about is if you're using the MacBook at the same time as you are charging. Say if your MacBook usually uses a 60 watt charger and you happen to be using a 20 watt charger at the moment and you're actually using your MacBook. Now how much power your MacBook uses depends on what you're doing. So maybe if you're just reading an article on the web 20 watts may be enough to actually charge it while you're using it. But if you're editing video in Final Cut Pro you might find your Mac is actually using more power than it is taking in from the charger and the battery is slowly draining. 

Now while we're talking about MacBooks another important point I want to bring up is if you have a current MacBook its got a MagSafe power port that means you can use a special MagSafe adapter to magnetically connect to it. This is great because if somebody accidentally trips over the cable it won't pull your MacBook off of the desk. But you can still use the USB ports to charge. So, for instance while traveling I usually don't bring my MagSafe cable. I just have one charger for all my devices and that has got USB cable and I just plug one of those into the USB-C port on my MacBook Air and it charges from there. 

Now another thing about MacBooks is they can actually provide a charge to other devices. So you can use a USB-C port on your MacBook, plug your iPhone into it and your iPhone will actually collect a charge from your MacBook. You can do the same thing with other devices. Like, for instance, you can charge Air Pods from it. As a matter of fact you can even charge Air Pods from an iPhone. Just connect them with a cable and the Air Pods case will take a charge from your iPhone.  

Now another question I get sometime is about the two different types of USB ports. You'll see the rectangular USB-A port which has been around for a long time, and the new smaller USB-C port. The question is do you have to connect to the right one for the right device. The answer is No. You just need the right cable, of course, to connect to USB-A or USB-C. But power is provided through either one of those. So, for instance, if you've got a wall outlet that has USB-A, as most of those do, you can get the right cable or a small adapter and use that to charge up your MacBook. So the charger's type of port, USB-A or USB-C doesn't matter. It is the amount of power that comes out of it that determines how fast your MacBook will charge. But either one will work. 

What about quality? Does it make a difference if, say, it's a high quality well-made charger versus a cheap one. Well, it does. But probably not for the reason you're thinking. If the charger works it will provide power to your device and your device will be fine. However, low quality chargers do have a tendency to break. So that cheap charger you picked up at a gas station or airport because you forgot yours, that one may not last very long. Sometimes it may only last weeks or months, or may break almost immediately. Of course even a high quality charger can break and even a low quality one can last a long time. It's more about the chances of it lasting. The same is very true for the wall outlets that you can buy to replace the outlets in your home. Those sometimes now come with USB-A or USB-C charging ports. Those tend to be very cheap unless you spend money to get a high quality one. It's more of a problem when these break because then you actually have to replace the wall outlet again. You can't just swap the charger. 

Now, of course, a lot of Apple devices charge wirelessly now, particularly iPhones. You can use Apple's wireless MagSafe charger. These are magnetic and will stick to the back of your iPhone. But you don't need to use Apple's. There are a whole variety of different ones. Some of them are magnetic like this. But others are not. You rest your iPhone on them. As long as your iPhone is one that can charge wirelessly then it should work. Now these typically aren't the charger themselves. The charger is what is plugged into the other end of this. But it is good to know you don't need to get Apple's wireless connectors to charge your iPhone wirelessly. Also I find that a lot of people don't realize that you can use these to actually charge your Air Pods if they come with a wireless charging case. You can just rest them on here and you can use a third party one as well. You don't have to get a particular one for the Air Pods to work. Just note that the light is on and it is charging. 

But do note that wireless charging isn't as efficient as the wire charging. So if you're in a situation where you want to get every ounce of power out of something, like you take a battery pack with you and you want to charge up your iPhone using it, using a wireless charger is not going to get as much power out of that battery as using a wired charger. 

Now let's talk about Quick Charge for a minute. If you have a device like an iPhone that says it is compatible with Quick Charge and you have a power adapter that also is compatible with Quick Charge then you can rapidly charge your phone using a higher voltage than normal. Both the adapter and the device have to be compatible with Quick Charge for this to work. Otherwise they will just default to the regular 5 volt charging. So if you have an iPhone that works with Quick Charge and you want to get that speed for charging, then you want to make sure you buy a third party power adapter that also supports Quick Charge. 

So I hope that answers a lot of questions that people have about using different chargers, specifically third party chargers, or chargers that aren't the same power rating as what came with your device. Hope you found this useful. Thanks for watching.