My favorite gaming phone feature -- which I've been using across the Asus ROG Phone 9 Pro and the RedMagic 10 Pro -- has very little to do with gaming. Both phones include faster 65-watt and 100-watt charging speeds, respectively, without requiring a specific adapter. Asus and RedMagic do include adapters in the box, with the former providing a 65-watt power brick while the latter provides an 80-watt brick. And on top of that, both phones include some of the largest batteries I've ever tested in a phone sold in the US, at 5,800 and 7,000 mAh, respectively.
Those stats alone are impressive and in my 30-minute fast charging tests, lead to phone batteries that go from totally drained to nearly topped up during that short period of time. Those charging speeds keep these phones from needing an overnight charge because plugging them in while getting dressed for the day should be enough to make them last until the evening when in normal use.
Battery tests: RedMagic 10 Pro vs. Asus ROG Phone 9 Pro vs. Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max vs. Samsung Galaxy S24
| 80W; 0% to 83% | 100% to 90% |
| 65W; 0% to 67% | 100% to 89% |
| 45W; 0% to 56% | 100% to 98% |
| 25W; 0% to 51% | 100% to 93% |
To get to these higher battery capacity numbers, both of these phones use two separate cells, which when charged simultaneously can lead to faster charging speeds and higher overall numbers. While the high-watt charging blocks are larger than older smaller-watt blocks and might take up a bit more space in your bag, most of the changes are happening in the phones themselves.
It is worth pointing out that these gaming phones partly have the faster charging and larger battery capacities to help the gaming-intensive audience stay powered up when playing Genshin Impact or Fortnite at their highest graphics settings over a long period of time. But faster charging speeds and dual-cell batteries would still be useful for phones that aren't necessarily optimized for gaming.
The Asus Zenfone 11 Ultra includes several of the battery features seen in its ROG line, including bypass charging for powering a device from an adapter without recharging its battery.
Mike Sorrentino/CNETOnePlus currently comes the closest to bringing dual-cell batteries and faster charging speeds to phones designed for mass audiences. For instance, the OnePlus 12 includes a 5,400 mAh battery (across two 2,700 mAh cells) and 80-watt charging in the US or 100-watt charging internationally. While that charging speed is comparable to what Asus and RedMagic offer, it unfortunately does come with the tradeoff that it must be used with a specialized SuperVooc power adapter shipped by OnePlus. Most other phones use the USB-PD protocol, which brings faster speeds across a much wider variety of power adapters and cables.
Most other phones I have tested that use a single cell battery tend to cap at a 5,000 mAh capacity, such as what is included in the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. Smaller phones tend to have smaller batteries, such as the 4,000 mAh-capacity one inside the $799 Samsung Galaxy S24. That base Galaxy S24 charges at a paltry 25 watts, which in our tests only recharged the battery to 51% after 30 minutes, a far cry from the 67% I recharged the Asus ROG Phone 9 Pro to after half an hour with its 65-watt charging speed.
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These speeds are often more common in phones sold internationally, and until recently most phones sold in the US tended to cap at a 45-watt or lower charging speed. Apple's iPhone 16 Pro series, for instance, just stepped up to 45-watt charging speeds after years of prior models sticking to a 20-watt speed. Both the $999 iPhone 16 Pro and $1,099 iPhone 16 Pro Max can recharge from 0% to roughly 56% using a wired charger for 30 minutes as a result. The base iPhone 16 and slightly larger iPhone 16 Plus are still charging at the slower 20-watt speed, but actually net similar speeds to the Pro. The iPhone 16 in our wired charging test recharged from 25% to 74%.
One the left is the OnePlus 9 Pro charging on the OnePlus 50-watt wireless charger. On the right, is the iPhone 12 Pro Max charging with the 15-watt MagSafe charger.
Patrick Holland/CNETWhat about faster wireless charging?
Wireless charging speeds have also been increasing, slowly but surely. The Qi2 wireless charging standard, currently available across most of Apple's iPhone line and the HMD Skyline, currently sets 15 watts as the wireless charging speed available across most phones. Proprietary protocols are also achieving slightly faster speeds, such as Apple's MagSafe, now supporting 25-watt wireless charging speeds for the iPhone 16.
OnePlus sells a 50-watt wireless charger that can hit that speed when using it with the OnePlus 12 using its own AirVooc protocol.
Wireless charging has its own conveniences, especially when taking an overnight charging approach and may already be a preferred method of charging when paired with magnetic accessories. But for now, it remains a slower way to juice up your phone than wired charging.
The RedMagic 10 Pro's larger battery and faster charging are meant to help power gaming-intensive features, but similar features would be appreciated on phones that don't focus on gaming.
Mike Sorrentino/CNETCan we get a day of phone use with just 30 minutes charging?
Recharging a phone is a constant inconvenience for any device. It's why there are a multitude of portable charging accessories, guides to replacing a degraded phone battery and so many options for wired and wireless charging. But when it comes to improving the speed of phone recharging, right now it's primarily the gaming phone space that's hitting the faster speeds that I hope find their way into more phones in 2025.
If phones can start pushing past 45 watts, it may even lead to the additional convenience of allowing them to take full advantage of USB-C laptop chargers that are already available in speeds of 61 watts and up. Apple itself, for instance, offers a 140-watt USB-C charger that's meant for the MacBook Pro, but it can be used with any phone that recharges over USB-C as well.
The ideal goal for this is simple. Let me recharge my phone completely while I make my morning coffee. And then have the phone last until I need to go to bed. With the speeds already available on gaming phones, perhaps the hope of these speeds making their way to more devices isn't too far away.
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