How to tell if a power bank in good quality

XTAR Light

Enlightened
Vendor
Joined
Apr 26, 2010
Messages
706
Location
China
Today I'd like to discuss how to tell a good quality power bank.

When we buy a power bank, we mainly consider two points: capacity and safety, followed by appearance,size and price.

Capacity of power bank


The power bank has three basic elements, namely the shell, the circuit board, and the battery cell. As the core component of the power bank, the battery cell has the highest cost. For example, a regular 20000 mAh power bank requires about 8 batteries. Assuming that the cost of each battery is US$5, the cost of a single power bank here will cost US$40. If the price of a 20,000 mAh power bank is only US$20, this power bank must be of poor quality.

The battery cells of power bank are generally lithium polymer or li-ion 18650 batteries. The larger the capacity, the larger the size. If your power bank has a large capacity but in a very small size, then you need to pay attention to its quality.

In addition, you can calculate the charging times. For example, a power bank, marked as 10,000mAh, can charge your mobile phone 3-4 times, but in fact it runs out after 1-2 times (when the power bank is fully charged), this power bank is likely to have a false capacity.

Safety of power bank


Whether the power bank is safe depends largely on two aspects - the battery cell and the shell.

The quality and quantity of battery cell must meet the standard. Inferior power bank batteries are prone to short circuits after rusting, which may cause explosions. At the same time, in extreme environments such as high temperatures, inferior batteries are more likely to explode.

The shell of a good power bank should have the ability to withstand flame retardancy and gravity shock.

Flame-retardant refers to the shell can be extinguished automatically after being ignited when the power bank occurs an explosion or combustion accident, which can prevent the battery cell from spontaneous combustion and cause further harm.

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Besides these aspects, what else should we pay attention to?
 

Lynx_Arc

Flashaholic
Joined
Oct 1, 2004
Messages
11,212
Location
Tulsa,OK
Actually I have high quality power banks that use larger cells and only take 6 cells for 20,000mah (3 for 10,000mah).
Power banks are rated for cell capacity not effective output capacity at 5V USB ports and most boost 3.7v to 5V and the devices "charged" from them reduce the voltage to charge another lithium battery and these two processes lose energy along the way so a phone that has a 3000mah battery in it will take more than 3000mah capacity of a power bank to charge it from 0% better power banks are higher in efficiency and better power banks can sustain higher current rates and hold the voltage on USB more stably. There is other features in good power banks such as proper detection of devices attached to them to support and optimize higher charging rates and some even support fast charging like Qualcomm and Power Delivery charging of devices. Some even support themselves being charged at higher rates using QC and PD formats.
Some power banks supports very low current outputs that have others shutting off unable to charge low capacity devices such as earbuds and the like and many have bar graph LED indicators some have digital readouts too.
Some support multiple USB types like micro USB and USB-C too.
There are some that even have built in lights too from a single cheap 5mm LED to a better LED and possibly a reflector.
 
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