So I just bought the Apple 240W charging cable and a 140W power brick. So how can I measure the actual wattage that is being delivered to my iPad/iPhone?
You could put a Kill-A-Watt meter between the charger and the wall, and see what it’s drawing.
But if you’re expecting 140 watt charging of an iPad or iPhone, you’re going to be very sad. I believe those cap out around 20 watts or so.
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Do you find those better than the more general meters that plug directly into the outlet? Seems like about the same price for something that’s less versatile.
Thanks for the recommendation, I just ordered one.
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I bought the meter and I’m charging up my iPad. It is charging at 35 watts, so it is nowhere near the 140 watt power brick, it is more than 20 watts. My MacBook is fully charged, but I plan to drain down the battery and see if it will get the full 140 watts.
Each device will fast charge up to whatever the highest voltage-amperage combination can be negotiated between the charger and device. It doesn’t matter if a cable or charger are rated higher. There are/were even situations (perhaps irrelevant on newer PD standards) where a certain charger did not support the highest voltage-current pair a device wanted so they negotiated down to a supported combination.
I couldn’t find exact numbers for current models but I’d guess iPads are in the 30-36W range and laptops in the 65-100W range depending on model.
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