A new report has surfaced revealing the iPhone 15 can not only charge itself and accessories, but it can also charge other devices, including Android.
It’s already known that with the USB-C cables for iPhone 15, you can just plug in a cable to charge an accessory through the phone. There’s no reverse wireless charging, but the USB-C cable can be used to charge AirPods, an Apple Watch MagSafe charger, or other accessories straight from the phone’s battery.
A recent YouTube review by Marques Brownlee revealed that there are other uses for iPhone 15 charging.
If any older Lightning iPhone is plugged into a USB-C iPhone, regardless of the charge state, the USB-C iPhone will always give battery to the Lightning iPhone.
If a USB-C iPhone is plugged into another USB-C iPhone, there’s a handshake that takes place, where they talk to each other, figure out which one has the lower battery, and the one with the higher battery becomes a power bank and will start charging the lower one.
With Android phones, what was found was that if the USB-C iPhone is plugged into an Android phone with higher battery, and that phone has USBPD, it will act like a battery bank. If the phone doesn’t have USBPD, it’s pretty inconsistent, and the current advice is to just unplug and try again.
The USBPD allows for the same handshake that occurs between two USB-C iPhones.
The iPhone’s battery is only 4W charging, so no fast charging is available. But it’s great for charging accessories, or a friend’s phone in a pinch.