Oppo shows off 15-minute smartphone charging tech

PanARMENIAN.Net - At Mobile World Congress, Oppo showed off its new SuperVOOC quick-charging technology — if real-world results are as promising as they say, Oppo fans will be able to fully charge some of their devices in 15 minutes, Engadget reports.

Oppo says that's about how much time it'll take to charge a dead 2,500mAh battery to 100%, and that the technology will work over traditional MicroUSB and USB Type-C cables. That's even faster than what Qualcomm's most recent QuickCharge 3.0 demos show — the fast-charging technology baked into chipsets like the Snapdragon 820 can get a smartphone from bone-dry to 80 percent in around 35 minutes. Of course, it's no surprise Oppo can squeeze better performance out of their system — it's more-or-less proprietary Oppo, so the company has full control over the battery, silicon and software involved. That's the sort of end-to-end control that helped Huawei figure out how to super-charge smartphones, too.

In some cases, you'll be able to get a full charge in less than 15 minutes. An Oppo hypeman plugged a metal-encased reference device into a charger and continued his spiel in Mandarin. Less than ten minutes later — after he discussed an algorithm that varies current to maximize charging efficiency while keeping temperatures low — the phone was back up to 100 percent.