Humans generate over 60 million metric tons (and rising) of e-waste annually. That’s over 130 billion pounds of plastic, wire, rare earth metals, battery chemicals, and other electronics detritus annually. Over four-fifths of it doesn’t reach the proper e-waste recycling facilities, which can waste more resources by often failing to turn a profit.
No Thanks, Keep Reading
Our old headphones, smartphones, and cables face destiny in a trash compactor. Our old electronics leach strange chemicals into the ground, water, and air. Those tons include uncountable phone chargers, possibly in the hundreds of millions. With more diverse, effective charging solutions than ever, do you need another cheap power adapter to throw away?
An epidemic of wall warts on a global scale
When getting free stuff goes wrong
When smartphones went mainstream around 2013, every phone used one of two connectors, and every box included a USB power adapter. Each day for years, a fresh-faced consumer somewhere walked into a store, bought their first phone, took it home, unboxed it, and plugged it into the charger it came with. That new-purchase ritual meant something, and always will, to some people.
Consumers revolted when Apple yanked chargers from iPhone 12 boxes in late 2020. Cutting off the unlimited charger supply became the new headphone jack removal. Samsung took cues from Apple and removed chargers from the Galaxy Z Fold 3’s $1,800 package. The trend proliferated among flagships, eventually trickling down the price ranges. Since then, buying a phone gets you a phone and maybe a cable, if you’re lucky.
Four years after the shift, many still fondly remember old times. My Samsung Galaxy S5 jumped underneath a car tire seven years ago. A nearby secondhand vendor unconsciously threw in a basic charger while selling me an identical S5. When I got home, I plugged my new, old phone into my trusty USB-C dock, chucking my new charger into a drawer alongside several others. I imagine it lived a happy life with its new desk drawer family. I never used it again.
But why did the corporation stop giving me presents?
OnePlus still provides chargers so that users can enjoy its class-leading fast charging.
Consider rule number 1. When a company uses resource conservation to justify withholding add-ons, it means its resources. After all, Galaxy S prices didn’t drop by $5 when Samsung axed the free power bricks. Waste reduction does take other forms, like reduced shipping costs and waste in the chargers’ absence. That also saved manufacturers money. However, while the corporations hid behind environmentalist platitudes, their vision wasn’t cut out of whole cloth.
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Most portable electronics have abandoned barrel plugs, and 30-pin connectors are fossils. As of December 28, 2024, the EU’s Common Charger Directive forced Apple and Xiaomi to stop selling non-USB-C phones in the EU. Years after beginning, complete adoption is almost here. I wonder how many Android Police readers own more phone chargers than they use.
Decrying the disappearance of ever-present gifts
It’s heartwarming to find common ground
Shall we gather around the fireplace and rip on leading phone manufacturers tonight?
People employ varying degrees of logic when complaining about not getting free chargers. Righteously balking at manufacturers’ pseudo-ecological excuses makes sense but doesn’t serve much practical purpose. Some pro-bundling arguments look nice but break down under critical examination. In reality, manufacturers shouldn’t provide free chargers with new phones. Consumer outcry won’t change the reality or manufacturers’ minds. Four years of hearing these faulty arguments proves it.
New phones should include all necessary components
Everyone agrees, and phones do. Their partially charged batteries resist storage damage while waiting on shelves. You shouldn’t have trouble starting the new setup process unless you import packed internal storage. Sometimes, a new, dual-ended USB-C cable allows reliable data transfer.
If companies cared about the environment, they’d use replaceable batteries
Fairphone makes some of the few smartphones and accessories with repairable designs and easily replaceable batteries, including the Fairbuds in-ear speakers.
This red herring ignores who doomed easy-access batteries. Consider how the Galaxy S5’s IP67 rating relied on a sub-2-millimeter gasket surrounding its back cover. It didn’t like dust or extended arid conditions and frequently failed. The iPhone’s locked-in battery had always foretold today’s glued-shut devices.
Consumers partly killed replaceable batteries by demanding things they couldn’t deliver. Waterproofing, zero-flex panels, and ever-more-svelte devices won. Add today’s increasing layers of sensitive components, and removable battery doors never stood a chance. That also applies to easy repairs. A vocal minority can’t stop consumer demands from forcing drastic engineering decisions.
Not everybody has handfuls of spare chargers
But the Android Police review desk certainly does.
Few can match the pile of disused adapters languishing in a tech reporter’s closet. But charger-lacking buyers of new phones know who they are. If you haven’t pried a cheap wall wart from thin, cardboard packaging in months, learn about the differently equipped, most useful accessories. They aren’t all created equal. Even if caught unaware or forgetting, most smartphone newbies can snag an adapter from a friend, family member, or gas station down the street. But planning accessory purchases from the jump proves more effective.
New charger buyers might pick the wrong protocol
$50 is a good price for letting Samsung’s first-party power bank get the most out of Galaxy charging.
Today’s charging port is largely a physical success. A kindergartener could tell you if a USB-C plug fits into a USB-A port. An adult devoid of all USB power adapters can’t go wrong. Research its standards and capabilities to get the most from a new device. Then, it’s easy to buy the right accessory.
The “wrong charger” crowd had a field day when the USB-C-equipped iPhone 15 dragged them into modernity. If anybody needs their hand held when evaluating new accessories, it’s an iPhone user. But Macbooks, staples of Apple’s near-mythical ecosystem, had unilaterally jumpstarted USB-C years earlier. Type-C wasn’t and isn’t new, and the iPhone’s forced accession received extensive coverage. Users knew what was coming.
If manufacturers cared about cost, they’d lower prices by the chargers’ value
Many tablets ship with premium chargers, like the high-end OnePlus Pad 2 and its impressive 80-watt SuperVOOC technology.
When manufacturers talk about costs, they mean their own. Sticker prices get memorable, round numbers that no 30-gram hunk of solder, wire, and plastic will affect. You can complain about it, but selling devices is Samsung’s job.
We do our part when we buy devices. Much-talked-about planned obsolescence pales compared to consumers paying more for better graphics, screens, and batteries. Some people drive six-year-old phones until the wheels fall off, but let’s be honest. We upgrade because we want to, not because we need to. It’s exciting. Maybe our anticipation drowned out the need for a new fast charger. We went to the store with the money to buy the phone, and we can get a charger.
Nixing in-box chargers was the right move
It’s our job — nay, our privilege — to pick the right charger
If your desk doesn’t house a 250-watt, Wi-Fi-enabled charging dock, what are you doing with your life?
Everything has pros and cons, like reduced charging times that can potentially harm battery health. The bleeding edge demands mental and financial investment. Some people never fully utilize their phones’ peak fast charging, by accident or apathy. Some phones treat fast charging like an afterthought, rarely reaching advertised peaks.
Isn’t the minutiae of protocols and plugs part of the fun? Doesn’t planning accessory purchases get the juices flowing? As a USB-C early adopter, I remember finding a 45-watt USB-PD brick that wouldn’t light my Windows tablet on fire. Years later, that feeling returned when I landed a fast-charging gallium nitride charger with enough ports and performance to drive all my portable electronics simultaneously.
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Owning the entire experience makes it easier, more productive, and more meaningful. Aren’t we here because we like advanced digital devices? We could reclaim that responsibility instead of demanding disposable e-waste handouts.
Free chargers had to die because they stunk
Some expensive chargers, such as the Pixel Stand 2, also stink.
The chargers decomposing in my closet share a critical drawback: they work poorly. I used one shortly after eviscerating the tablet packaging that housed it. It got concerningly hot for its wimpy 8-watt output. I don’t need more of those, and you probably don’t, either.
Remember how cutting-edge technology demands investment? We never got premium chargers in every box. The Galaxy S24 Ultra’s included cable didn’t support the phone’s 45-watt maximum. You can bet prices would increase if we convinced Samsung to include top-of-the-line charging hardware in every package. I don’t want to subsidize your fast-charging addiction. What’s next? Will there be demands for bundled Qi2 chargers and complaints when we don’t get a free car mount?
Picking our own chargers for our own good
Stop blaming the market. Own your accessory destiny
In defense of free chargers, they contribute negligible amounts to the growing e-waste mountain. Also, individual accessory purchases introduce waste vectors, as companies ship compact electronics in comically large boxes. Plus, stress from 80-watt peaks and hot wireless charging decrease battery lifespan.
As a no-free-chargers evangelist, I’ll argue that you don’t need a new charger. You might not need a new phone, either, but that decision rests with you. By removing chargers from boxes, manufacturers reinforce that your gadget game plan lies solely on your shoulders.
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Compare mediocre, bundled chargers to the earbuds we also stopped getting. We used them, and they worked, but did we know any better? Did blind testing prove they sounded better than tin cans? Probably not, and no, in that order. But we know better now. Even the most frugal consumers would notice the gulf in performance between bottom-of-the-barrel, bundled earbuds and an entry-level aftermarket pair.
Patronizing corporate greenwashing may have predicted the future
It can’t be all bad. Free chargers died for this.
Eventually, markets and hardware matured, power users stepped forward, and average consumers got swept up in the wave. With ever-expanding charging options and straightforward smartphone power monitoring, we no longer need manufacturers to baby us with cheap, in-box freebies. The cuts started with corporate lies about saving the planet and led us here. Today, demanding a low-quality charger alongside a high-dollar phone borders on silly.
In reality, chargers barely constitute a drop in the ocean of consumer tech excess, and we will always need them. But when companies stopped giving them away like water, we won an opportunity to refine our ecosystem. Carrying a versatile, all-in-one charger and two-cable, four-device setup reminds me of how I crafted my experience without corporate throw-ins. Even more fulfilling, today’s impressive power stations allow fully powered outdoor adventures using modern battery tech. Accepting the death of in-the-box phone chargers marks one small step for a user and, hopefully, part of a giant leap for an industry with significant resources still to burn.
