Motorola wants to ride the remote wireless charging wave

Xiaomi and other Chinese manufacturers have touted this feature.

What you need to know

• Motorola wants to join the remote wireless charging wave with its new partnership.
• It’s teaming up with GuRu, a leader in the field.
• Other Chinese companies such as Xiaomi and Oppo have also dabbled in bringing remote wireless charging to their devices.

Forget wireless charging and wireless charging pads, the future is in charging your devices from a distance. You’d be sitting next to a wireless charging hub, and your phone would be charging passively in without you needing to really do much. At least, that’s what Motorola believes. The company has partnered with GuRu Wireless, Inc., a global leader in customizable, over-the-air power solutions to bring over-the-air wireless charging to its future smartphones.

Dan Dery, VP of Product at Motorola, delivered the following comment:

At Motorola we are constantly working to bring innovations to the market that can improve our consumers’ lives. With this solution we will provide a glimpse of the freedom and flexibility that users can enjoy with a revolutionary over-the-air, wireless power technology. With GuRu, we imagine a new generation of wirelessly powered devices.

Wireless air charging is not a new thing. Companies have been touting it since the late 2010s, hoping for a world in which charging your device is a lot like using WiFi and wires are regarded in a manner as niche as ethernet. Xiaomi even debuted its first Air Chargers. Unlike WiFi, however, charging your phone remotely poses a new set of problems.

As the Washington Post noted in a piece looking at the practicality of over the air charging:

Companies wishing to deploy such over-the-air charging hubs face several challenges, the most prominent of which is physics. The further away from a direct power source, the lower the charging efficiency. So even if your phone does receive some power at a distance, it might not be a meaningful amount.

Still, there’s no harm in trying. Companies have been innovating in regular old wireless charging, managing to reach speeds that match or even outperform wired fast charging. Over-the-air wireless charging may be a moonshot, but landing among the stars wouldn’t be so bad either.

Still a nice flagship

Motorola Edge

$500 at Amazon
$500 at Best Buy
$500 at B&H

An excellent entry in the value flagship market

The Moto G100 might be great value, but its phones like the Motorola Edge that new innovations will debut in. We found it was built incredibly well, with a killer screen, great performance, and a battery that lasts all day.