All mobile phones, tablets, earphones and a wide range of other portable consumer electronics will need to be sold with USB-C charging ports from Saturday, the EU has announced.
First introduced around a decade ago, USB-C charging ports are reversible and capable of accelerated data transfer and charging speeds, the latter known as 'fast charging’.
In a statement on Friday, the European Parliament said that as of the following day, all such devices sold in the EU must have a USB-C charging port, with laptops set to follow suit in late April 2026.
That’s very good.
Usb-c might have its issues, but who is perfect?
It works great, provided you get good cables, and its just perfect for charging. Which is this all about.
Yeah maybe the other 10th functions in usb-c standard could be messy, but this is about charging and not HDMI or audio or whatever mix.
I want 3.5mm jack for audio anyway and not usb-c!
Here is your new device with a USB-C port*
only compatible with the specific cable provided in the box
i see people complain about this constantly yet i have never heard anyone irl complain about it, i’m starting to believe you’re all literally just making it the fuck up
I’m pretty sure people are just reading what they want to read. The actual box will say something like “please only use the cable provided”, and this makes sense because that’s the only cable they have tested to be safe.
It’s just a simple phrase to make sure that when some idiot uses three different converters on six cord extensions, he can’t sue the company when his house is on fire.
No there are some silly proprietary techs which either prevent compatibility or severely limit charging speed. As well as a lot of devices which simply didn’t bother to put any circuitry in and just used the USB-C port as a dumb power connector which only works with their charger and cable. I provided examples in my last message.
People assume it’s “just a cable” and might not understand some of the details.
Cables contain a chip to tell devices the power they can carry safely.
So most USB-C cables should work to a degree, but might not be enough to power a device fully. The default is to allow 60W, but the USB-C standard currently allows for up to 240W. So a random seizure-brand cable from Amazon may “work” but be unable to power the device while it’s running.
There was also an issue a few years ago where devices could draw too much power and destroy whatever was charging them. Not so bad if it was a charger, but it was happening to laptops when you plugged a phone into them.
Other things not in the standard but easy to find are USB-C extension cables, and cables with USB-A (regular rectangular USB) on one end and USB-C on the other.
Definitely, USB-C is a standard and as such can’t be modified to be incompatible.
A few years ago I decided to make sure everything I purchased was USB-C where possible. Items I have that I can think of:
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Philips Sonicare toothbrush case - only works with USBA to C cable.
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BlockBlueLight hexagon night light - only charges with the cable supplied USBA to C.
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air mattress (random Amazon brand) inflator has USB c charger that will not charge anything but does allow the inflator to work, no power bank or USB-C charger works.
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I have several “non-iQ” chargers with random incompatibility between Samsung and Apple devices.
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A tennis racket style electric fly swatter works with some chargers and not others
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USB-C IR camera which works on android but not on new iPhones due to some power pin incompatibility.
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I have a drawer full of USB-C cables with various ratings up to 140w, have to select the correct one for the application.
It may be just that these are all pre-EU unifying the standards, but there is enough USB-C e-waste in my house that I purchased in good faith that USB-C means it’s compatible, but it isn’t.
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The EU specified that it can’t be the case.
Doesn’t the regulation also specify the support of USB PD for fast charging?
USB-C is a comedy standard
Finally caught up to Brazil
Absolute W moment.
too bad the usb-c standard has so many problems. still better than nothing, but definitely a big missed opportunity
Such as? The only problem I’ve had is that the cables tend to go bad faster than past USB cables (especially DP output and fast charging), which I can’t be too mad about since so many different things are crammed down a thin wire.
USB C suffers from distance degrading earlier in distance. https://community.infineon.com/t5/Knowledge-Base-Articles/Maximum-length-of-the-cable-for-applications-in-USB-Type-C/ta-p/250571.
There is a lack of consistent standards. They’re all over the place and manufacturers just do whatever they want. Because of this, you can literally have only one cable or adapter that works for a device. In some cases, a third party cable can actually damage the device.
My anecdotal experience:
3.5mm to USB C adapter in three versions. I need one for an Android based tablet and a laptop. I have one from three different brands, Walmart, Apple and Google. The Walmart version works, but every single time you play audio from silence a pop is heard. The Apple version doesn’t work at all. The Google version works perfectly.
For the USB cable itself, it’s rated at 100W and comes from BestBuy. My laptop detected that the provided cable isn’t their OEM version and limits power intake to 65W instead of 100W. My tablet uses the full 85W and my phone uses the full 18W from their respective chargers.
One would be under the assumption that these products are universal, but this isn’t the case.
Are you burning through USB C cables faster than micro USB cables? I think I’ve lost one in the past 5 years.
Yeah they last about 6 months to a year in my experience. I have MicroUSB cables from 15 years ago that still work.
What brand are you buying?
You should look at how you handle them or where do you buy them. My oldest is still fine after 8 years.
It is impossible for me to handle things gently; I have ADHD
yay!
Can anyone tell me if this applies to cameras? I’m not in the EU but there’s still lots of cameras being sold with micro usb charging and very few with usb-c.
As regards digital cameras, the radio equipment concerned is any digital photo and video camera, including action cameras. Digital cameras designed exclusively for the audiovisual sector or the security and surveillance sector should not be required to integrate the harmonised charging solution.
what constitutes exclusive audiovisual sector digital cameras I am not sure. It’s probably defined elsewhere.
https://www.theverge.com/24330106/usb-c-common-charger-directive-explained-europe
This article is a bit more comprehensive, it says that every device that needs up to 100 Watt must be using USB-C, so cameras are explicitly included.
Portable gaming devices with a higher power intake seem to be excluded.
I don’t buy any Apple products, but I supported their decision to keep their hardware compatibility by using legacy standards (which were great when they came out). Now docking stations, and such become obsolete.
Also, who determines the standards we follow and why is government stepping in to support a standard that took money to develop against another that took money to develop? These things should die on their own.
why is government stepping in to support a standard
Imposing standards in commerce is one of the main things that government has done throughout the history of government.
And one of the few things the EU does very well for the consumer
Having a unified standard is simply better than allowing every hardware company to exploit their customers by making them buy their chargers, while increasing the amount of different chargers they need.
Not to mention, the lightning plug was decent when it came out but stats wise it’s WAY shittier than USB-C now. It’s slow in charging speed and crazy slow in data transfer, and it’s predatory in that only apple can make/use them.
480 Mb/s vs 40 Gb/s, wild
Hasn’t Apple maintained their standard longer, and therefore has more chargers likely already available to those that have chosen their ecosystem? It’s not their fault the others didn’t adopt their standard either.
Apples lightening has been around for a while, but so has USB-C. Don’t forget that Apple was really the first to go all in on USB-C on their laptops so this isn’t something unachievable for them. The big thing to me is that the EU is only forcing phones, laptops and earphones on this rather than making most small devices compatible with type C. Type C has a ton of built in support for other devices but we still allow shitty manufacturing to build barrel plug based devices when they really should switch.
While I agree with the USB-C standard, I have wishes. It’s a compromised design which is the best of a challenging dynamic existence. Extension are an example.
With that said, I work with a wide range of instruments. The Variation of DC standard is important for the conditions that they need. 12V, vs 24, vs 5v and the amperage. So while I hate barrel, I would rather have them then the USB-C give the dumb nature of the barrels. The negotiated power is challenging as a universal when you need reliability in harsh conditions. (Which the world really is when you step out of cities.)
Lmao you can’t actually make lightning chargers, they are proprietary. Apple wouldn’t want to use the same charger everyone else uses(and manufactures), as that would hurt their bottom line. So it is ABSOLUTELY their fault others didn’t adopt their standard, and lightning is shit anyway.
Good job! I got pwned!
but theyre also the one who uses seperate chargers even between their own devices. e.g their laptops tablets were USB-C while their phones beforehand were thunderbolt. There was really no reason to arbitrary keep both alive when the company itself already uses the standard
iPads have USB-C ports… but only on the chargers, not the devices. (Maybe not the newest models) Like, WTF!? So they’re paying to use the standard on the only part of the charging equation people don’t really care about. Then using Lightning on the iPad itself…
I have a white C to C that came with a phone, and a white C to lightning that came with the headphones. Please just make them all C
pros, minis, and modern airs used usb-c, the base ipad was the last to move off it. the fact that the tablet line is split is completely nonsense.
Because needs change as technology changes.
Uhm why are you complaining here? Thunderbolt (intel and apple) is compatible with USB-C. And also sucks to be apple for always having an extra and refusing to use USB specifications. They are the ONLY ONE who are solely on thunderbolt. Reminds you of Firewire?
And why is Europe intervening here (Europe isnt a government btw) to dictate consumer friendly practices. For example remember when every Phone had its own Charging Port? Reduced to Micro-USB.
- Fuck Apple and their “standards”
- Fuck apple shills
- Fuck American mentality about “government shouldn’t set standards”
That’s all.
- Fuck ever releasing a new standard to supercede usb-c because now that it’s enshrined in law you’d have to overcome a mountain of beurocracy to do so
You know what I love about Apple?
It’s really easy to give exact instructions on how to do things to the less tech savvy because they have so few variations in their product line.
That’s it.
Well, at least until they have a new iOS release and move everything in the settings around again.
Well, they change things more on major releases. Unlike Microsoft……
It’s not the government deciding on a standard, it’s a cross-industry consortium of involved/affected companies deciding together. Why should we accept that some companies refuse to follow common standards, massively increasing electronic waste and making people’s lives unnecessarily more annoying?
Would you also prefer if you had to buy an Apple™ Wall Plug to be allowed to charge your Apple™ devices? After all, why should the government be allowed to set those standards?
Also, who determines the standards we follow and why is government stepping in to support a standard that took money to develop against another that took money to develop?
Apple was involved in the development of USB type C as well.
