Tag Archives: batteries

Carrying a Separate Power Bank Was Always Annoying, so Nokia Fixed It

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The idea of carrying a power bank separately has never been particularly glamorous. It’s another thing to charge, another thing to forget, and another thing to dig out of your bag just when you need it. The Nokia 300 Charge sidesteps that by folding the power bank into the phone itself, a feature phone with a 3,700mAh battery that can share its charge with other devices.

That 3,700mAh figure sounds modest until you consider what it’s sitting inside. Most feature phones top out well below 2,000mAh, and the Nokia 110 Power only packs 1,750mAh, despite the name. The 300 Charge has more than double that, giving you up to 37 hours of talk time and over 40 days of standby. For a phone living in a drawer or a travel bag, those numbers genuinely matter.

Designer: HMD Global

The reverse charging works through the same USB-C port the phone charges from, activated by a dedicated button on the side. Press it, plug in a cable, and the 300 Charge starts pushing 10W out to whatever’s connected. An included 4-in-1 cable covers most devices you’d commonly carry, and the phone itself charges at the same 10W speed when it’s on the receiving end.

Long travel days and power outages share a common anxiety: a smartphone dying when there’s no wall socket in sight. You’d normally be counting on someone else’s power bank to get through. With the Nokia 300 Charge in your bag, you’re already carrying the solution. It’s the kind of device that makes sense stashed in a go-bag, a glove compartment, or a festival backpack before a long weekend.

Then there’s the torch. The Nokia 300 Charge has a high-power LED flashlight that’s reportedly four times brighter than the one on the Nokia 105. That kind of output actually matters when the power goes out, or you need to navigate somewhere dark. Rather than a gimmick, it’s one of the more immediately useful things on the device, especially given what the phone is designed to handle.

The phone is built for situations where things get knocked around. A rugged chassis with a textured, anti-slip grip keeps it secure in your hand, while the overall package comes in at 138 grams and about 15mm thick. It doesn’t feel like a compromise between durability and portability. Available in Sandstone, Green, and Black, the colorways lean practical rather than flashy.

On the inside, the Nokia 300 Charge keeps things simple. A 2.4-inch display, a microSD slot expandable up to 32GB, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and dual SIM support cover the basics. Connectivity is 2G only, which limits it to regions where that network infrastructure is still active. It’s worth confirming coverage before picking one up for travel, since some markets have already shut down their 2G networks.

The Nokia 300 Charge launched in the Philippines at around $32, with a wider international rollout expected. The battery is removable, a practical detail that most phone makers have quietly dropped. It charges at 10W via USB-C, matching the same output it provides when sharing power. A feature phone that calls, texts, lights your way, and tops up other devices at that price doesn’t need a complicated pitch.

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The World’s Slimmest Power Station (2.6″) Was Built for Your Fridge

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Backup power is one of those things most people don’t think about until they absolutely have to. You lose electricity during a storm, open the fridge out of habit, and then spend the next few days doing an anxious mental calculus on whether the leftovers are still safe to eat. It’s a frustratingly universal experience, and for all the innovation happening in home tech right now, it’s remarkable how little of it was pointed directly at the refrigerator. Jackery apparently noticed that gap too.

The FridgeGuard is a dedicated refrigerator backup battery, and the first thing that sets it apart is how thoroughly it was designed for the space it actually occupies. At just 2.6 inches thick and weighing around 23 pounds, Jackery calls it the world’s slimmest power station. Visually, you believe it. It looks less like industrial equipment and more like something an architect might quietly approve for a kitchen renovation. You can mount it on the wall behind your fridge, prop it vertically beside it, or lay it flat on top. That flexibility isn’t a minor feature; it’s a design decision that understands most people are not trying to add a bulky, yellow generator to their kitchen aesthetic.

Designer: Jackery

The technical side is where it gets genuinely interesting. The FridgeGuard runs on a 1,024Wh battery capacity and delivers power through a single 110V outlet, which sounds limiting until you remember this thing exists for one appliance and one appliance only. It delivers up to 1,600 watts of compressor-ready power, which is exactly what you need for a refrigerator’s startup surge. Jackery calls their system FridgeSafe Technology, and it covers the practical details: a switchover time of under 10 milliseconds so your fridge doesn’t even notice the grid went down, a Delay Start to protect the compressor, and surge protection built right in. Standard runtime is estimated at around 15 hours on a full charge, which doubles to roughly 30 hours if you pair it with the optional expansion battery that brings total capacity to 2,048Wh.

The lifespan claim is the detail that sticks with me. The battery cells are rated for 6,000 cycles, which Jackery projects translates to up to 16 years of use while retaining 70% of capacity. For context, most portable power stations don’t come close to that kind of longevity. It reframes the FridgeGuard from being a reactionary purchase after a bad storm to a genuine long-term home investment. That shift in positioning matters, and it’s the kind of thinking that tends to change who buys into a product category.

Cold weather performance deserves a mention too, especially for people in northern climates, remote cabin owners, RV users, or anyone planning to store the unit in an unheated garage. The FridgeGuard can both charge and discharge at temperatures as low as -20°C, a spec that puts it well ahead of many competitors that restrict operation in colder conditions. For a product meant to function year-round in unpredictable situations, that’s a more meaningful detail than it might initially seem.

Is it perfect? Not entirely. The single AC outlet means if you need to run anything else alongside your fridge during an outage, you’re out of luck. And since an average full-sized refrigerator draws roughly 1,300Wh per day, the standard battery alone won’t cover a full 24 hours without the expansion add-on. These are real constraints worth knowing before you buy.

But the bigger picture here is that Jackery figured out something the home backup industry has been surprisingly slow to grasp: people want solutions that fit their lives, not ones they have to build their lives around. The FridgeGuard doesn’t just solve a problem; it does it in a way that respects the space it lives in. That combination of smart form, solid function, and genuine forward-thinking is exactly the kind of product design worth paying attention to, whether you’re in the market for one or not.

The post The World’s Slimmest Power Station (2.6″) Was Built for Your Fridge first appeared on Yanko Design.

Most Laptops Seal the Battery In, Dynabook’s New One Lets You Swap It

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AI on laptops has created a new kind of battery problem. The promise of on-device AI processing, where the work stays local rather than routing through a cloud server, is genuinely useful for anyone handling sensitive data. But running a neural processing unit alongside everything else a laptop already juggles accelerates battery wear in ways that weren’t as much of a concern three years ago. The battery that comes with a new laptop today degrades faster than the hardware around it.

Most manufacturers solve this by designing the battery to be inaccessible. The result is that when a battery eventually loses capacity, it’s either a service center visit or a new laptop. Dynabook’s 2026 fall and winter lineup takes a different position by making the battery user-replaceable in two of its Panther Lake models, the 14-inch XP9/XP7 and the 13.3-inch X9/X7. A sliding panel lets owners swap it themselves without tools or a technician.

Designer: Dynabook

The reasoning is spelled out plainly in the press release: heavy AI use accelerates battery degradation, and forcing users to choose between repair costs and a full replacement creates unnecessary financial pressure and waste. A replacement battery sold separately as an optional accessory means the rest of the hardware, which is still perfectly functional, gets to stay in use longer. It’s a longevity argument that happens to line up with right-to-repair expectations at the same time.

The XP9/XP7, a 14-inch Copilot+ PC, comes in at 999 g, while the X9/X7 at 13.3 inches checks in at 948 g. Both run Intel’s Core Ultra Series 3 Panther Lake processors. The X9/X7 claims up to 17 hours of video playback and up to 32.5 hours at idle, which is a considerable buffer for a machine that doubles as an on-device AI workstation. Both models pass MIL-STD-810H military-grade durability testing.

Connectivity is genuinely comprehensive for an ultra-light design. Thunderbolt 4 and USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A ports sit on both sides of the chassis, alongside HDMI output, a LAN port, and a microSD card slot. That’s a full professional port layout without a dongle in sight, which matters for anyone who has spent time hunting for the right adapter in a conference room. Dolby Atmos handles audio on both models.

The on-device AI processing is the capability that sits behind the user-replaceable battery feature in a practical sense. Running local AI keeps private and sensitive data from leaving the machine, which the press release frames as a concrete advantage over cloud-dependent workflows. The AI privacy assist feature also detects attempts to view the screen from unintended angles, adding a physical layer to what would otherwise be a software-only privacy story.

For those who want the same 13.3-inch form factor at the lowest possible weight, the G9 comes in at 899 g with the same Panther Lake processor and MIL-STD-810H certification. It doesn’t include the user-replaceable battery design, but it undercuts the X9/X7’s weight by nearly 50 g, which matters when the laptop travels daily. All models launched in Japan on August 7, with no global availability confirmed yet.

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Camera Batteries Go Missing, So This $70 One Tracks Itself

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Camera batteries are one of those accessories that photographers never think about until something goes wrong. They’re small enough to vanish into the bottom of a bag or a jacket pocket, common enough to own several of and regularly mix up, and important enough that losing one mid-trip can force an early stop to a shoot. The solution most people reach for is buying more of them, which only increases the number of things to keep track of.

The FALCAM TagBatt addresses the problem from inside the battery itself. Compatible with Sony’s NP-FZ100 form factor, it integrates Apple’s Find My tracking technology directly into the cell, so the battery carries its own location data wherever it goes. If it ends up left behind at a studio, a venue, or the seat pocket of a flight, the Find My app will flag it and show its last known position.

Designer: FALCAM

Because the tracker lives inside the battery rather than clipped to a camera strap or screwed into a cage mount, it’s considerably harder to spot. An opportunistic thief who grabs a camera bag and removes any obvious Bluetooth puck from the outside can’t strip out what’s already built into the power source. It’s the kind of discreet integration that external trackers can’t quite replicate, no matter how small they get.

The tracking isn’t the only thing the TagBatt changes about how a camera battery behaves. A built-in USB-C port lets it charge directly from any standard USB-C source, including a power bank or a travel adapter, without needing the dedicated Sony battery charger that typically takes up its own space in a kit bag. Pop it out of the camera, plug it in overnight, and it’s ready in the morning without routing around a charger at all.

Capacity comes in at 2,600mAh against the OEM Sony NP-FZ100’s 2,280mAh, which translates to a modest but real advantage per charge. An advanced decoding chip handles the communication with the camera’s internal systems so the body treats it as it would any genuine battery, with accurate charge-level reporting and none of the “non-genuine battery” warning messages that typically accompany third-party cells.

Compatibility covers a wide sweep of Sony’s current lineup, including the Alpha 7 series through the Alpha 7 V, the Alpha 9 series, the Alpha 6700, the FX3 and FX30, and the ZV-E1, among others. A Canon LP-E6 version is also available now, with Nikon EN-EL15 and Fujifilm NP-W235 versions confirmed to be in development.

At $69.99, the TagBatt costs more than a standard third-party replacement but considerably less than the Sony original, and it comes with two capabilities that the original simply doesn’t offer. For photographers who travel frequently, work in locations where gear occasionally goes astray, or are just tired of carrying a charger they’d rather leave at home, the trade-off makes a fairly straightforward case.

The post Camera Batteries Go Missing, So This $70 One Tracks Itself first appeared on Yanko Design.

At $230, This Gaming Headset Keeps Playing While You Swap Its Battery

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Wireless gaming headsets have carried a quiet contradiction since they first appeared. Cutting the cable was supposed to mean more freedom, but the moment the battery dropped, you were plugging back in anyway, tethered to a wall or a charging dock and waiting. The industry’s answer has been to push battery life further with each generation, but even a 60- or 70-hour headset runs flat eventually, usually in the middle of something.

Glorious took a different angle with the GHS Wireless InfinitePlay. Rather than chasing a single larger battery, the headset ships with two hot-swappable 85-hour battery packs and an internal Guardian Battery reserve that bridges the gap during the moment of the swap. The result is a headset that, in practical terms, never actually stops playing, because by the time one pack drains, the other is already charged and ready.

Designer: Glorious

The system works through a dual-purpose charging base that also serves as the 2.4 GHz wireless dongle. One battery sits in the headset while the other charges on the base. When the depleted pack comes out and the charged one slots in, the Guardian Battery, which can run the headset independently for about 3 hours, has already kept audio uninterrupted through the swap. There’s no pause in sound and no drop in connection.

Combined, the two packs add up to more than 170 hours of capacity. For any kind of extended session, a long run at a tournament, a weekend of back-to-back play, or everyday use where charging gets forgotten, the swap-based approach removes the anxiety from the equation entirely. Swap the battery, put the depleted one on the dock, and carry on without another thought about it.

The headset is built around 40mm custom-tuned drivers angled to improve clarity and stereo imaging, covering a frequency response of 20Hz to 20kHz. The detachable boom microphone is noise-cancelling, and the ear cups use memory foam padding over a suspension headband that distributes the 360g weight across the top of the head. Connectivity covers both 2.4 GHz wireless for low-latency gaming and Bluetooth 5.4 for everything else, switchable with one button press.

That Bluetooth mode makes the headset practical outside the gaming setup too. Moving from a PC session to a phone call or a commute doesn’t require switching to a different pair of headphones. The same swap-and-go logic applies to any situation where the headset is living on your head for extended stretches, and the battery system works just as well whether you’re at a desk or out the door.

Most hot-swappable headsets at higher price points make the process awkward or require specific docking sequences. Glorious kept it simple enough to execute mid-session without missing a beat, which is ultimately the only version of this feature that actually matters. The GHS Wireless InfinitePlay is priced at $229.99 and comes in black and white. Both battery packs and the charging base are included in the box, so the whole swappable system is ready to go from day one, not sold separately as an add-on down the line.

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Dead Battery by Noon? This 45W Pocket Charger Fixes That for Good

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Battery anxiety has become a familiar part of modern daily life. Smartphones, wireless earbuds, tablets, and handheld gaming devices all run down faster than most people expect, and the window between a full charge in the morning and a dead battery by mid-afternoon keeps shrinking. Portable chargers exist precisely to solve that, but most of them are still too thick and heavy to carry comfortably every day.

The INIU Pocket Rocket P50 tries to change that calculation. It’s a compact 10,000mAh power bank with 45W fast charging, packed into an ultra-light 160g body that’s small enough to fit in a pocket. With advanced thermal management for stable charging on the go and a built-in USB-C cable for ease of use, INIU built it around a fairly straightforward premise: the best backup charger is the one you’ll actually have with you when you need it most.

Designer: INIU

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Think about the kind of day that starts early and doesn’t slow down. You’re out the door before your phone is fully charged, the bag’s already heavier than you’d like, and by mid-morning, the battery indicator has already started to creep downward. Having the INIU P50 Pocket Rocket in your pocket means you don’t have to plan around outlets or change your route just to find somewhere to charge.

Travel is another situation where the INIU P50 earns its keep. Long airport layovers, train rides, and road trips have a way of draining devices faster than expected, and spending time hunting for a free outlet while juggling luggage isn’t how anyone wants to spend their time. With its compact and lightweight 160g body, this 10,000 mAh portable charger fits easily into a carry-on or daypack without taking up the kind of space better reserved for actual travel essentials.

Of course, a small form factor only tells part of the story. The 45W fast charging is what keeps the INIU P50 Pocket Rocket from feeling like just a novelty. That’s fast enough to charge an iPhone 17 to 70% in 25 minutes. Rather than slowly inching a phone battery up over an hour, it pushes out enough power to make a noticeable difference in a short window, which is exactly what most people need when they’re moving between tasks with little time to spare.

Whether it’s a quick top-up during a lunch break, a longer charge during a flight, or just keeping a pair of earbuds alive through a long afternoon of calls, the speed makes those short windows count for more. It shifts the INIU P50 from something you carry just in case to something that actively keeps your devices running through whatever the day ends up looking like.

Not every feature on the INIU P50 is about speed or capacity. There’s a USB-C GoCord lanyard cable that’s integrated into the unit but detaches when needed, so there’s always one ready without having to dig through a bag for a spare. A real-time smart display shows exactly how much charge is left, and an optional engraving for names or icons makes the whole thing feel genuinely personal. Advanced thermal management also offers peace of mind, knowing you’re getting not only the most stable but also the safest charging experience possible.

Then there’s the question of how it looks, which isn’t as superficial a concern as it might seem. Most power banks are anonymous black or grey bricks, designed with no apparent interest in how they appear outside of a drawer. The INIU P50 Pocket Rocket comes in a range of colors that let it feel like a considered personal accessory rather than a piece of emergency hardware you apologize for pulling out.

Portable chargers have been around long enough that the category can start to feel routine, but the INIU P50 Pocket Rocket is a good reminder that there’s still room to do it better. Getting 10,000mAh of capacity and 45W of output into something genuinely pocketable, with enough design character to make it feel intentional rather than incidental, takes more thought than most people might expect.

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This Battery Charger Shows Which AAs Are Dead on an E-Ink Display

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The drawer full of half-used AA and AAA batteries, some new, some dead, some leaking, is familiar. The last-minute scramble for batteries when a remote dies usually means digging through the pile, testing them one by one, and feeling uneasy about throwing spent alkalines into the trash. The problem is not just waste, it is the lack of a clear system for how we power small devices scattered around a home.

Linogy is a rechargeable battery ecosystem built around 1.5 V Li-ion AA and AAA cells plus an all-in-one smart station. The station lives on a desk or shelf, acting as a battery tester, fast charger, and organizer case that holds up to 40 cells. The goal is to replace the random drawer with a single, visible place where all your batteries live and get managed.

Designer: Linogy

Disposable alkalines are convenient but add up to billions of cells tossed each year, along with tens of thousands of tons of waste and CO₂. Ni-MH rechargeables solve part of that but bring their own quirks: 1.2V output that some devices dislike, high self-discharge, lower energy density, and slow charging that makes topping them up feel like a chore you keep postponing.

Linogy’s cells pack around 3,600mWh and deliver stable 1.5V, closer to what devices expect from alkalines, so performance and battery indicators behave more predictably. The cells are rated for up to 1,200 cycles, meaning one rechargeable can stand in for roughly 1,200 disposables over its life, and built-in protection layers handle overcharge, short circuit, and drop impacts without leaks or smoke.

Dropping a mix of AA and AAA cells into the station, it automatically detects type, health, and charge level. The e-ink display shows which batteries are full, which are charging, and which are ready to retire, without bright LEDs or guesswork. A full charge takes around three hours, and once topped up, the station stops charging and simply holds the cells until something needs power.

The station is compatible with Linogy’s Li-ion cells, Ni-MH, and Ni-Cd AA and AAA batteries. You do not have to throw out existing rechargeables; the same box can test and charge them while you gradually swap in higher-capacity 1.5V cells. Over time, the random mix becomes a more coherent set of batteries you actually trust instead of avoiding.

A simple change in how you handle AA and AAA power can reduce waste and friction. One Linogy cell replacing up to 1,200 alkalines, recyclable packaging, and a charger that looks like a small appliance rather than a tangle of cables all add up. It turns the humble battery from something you forget about until it fails into a part of the home that is designed, visible, and surprisingly satisfying to keep in order.

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Anker SOLIX E10 Brings Hybrid Whole-Home Backup to the Modern House

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Modern homes depend on electricity for everything, from fridges and routers to medical devices and central A/C. Storms, rolling blackouts, and grid hiccups trigger a familiar scramble for flashlights and ice bags. Food spoils, devices die, and working from home becomes impossible. Most backup options either feel like camping gear with a couple of outlets or like a renovation project with permits and opaque pricing.

Anker SOLIX E10 is a smart hybrid whole-home backup system that blends batteries, green solar power, and a smart generator into one coordinated setup. It is designed to keep an entire house running, not just a few circuits, and is rated for whole-home backup with a 200-amp connection when paired with its Power Dock, matching a typical US main panel.

Designer: Anker

On a normal day, the SOLIX E10 quietly charges from solar and the grid, storing energy in modular 6 kWh battery packs that can scale to around 90 kWh with multiple stacks. When the power drops, the system steps in, deciding when to draw from batteries, when to add fuel through a DC link to its tri-fuel smart generator, and when to resume solar charging once the storm clears.

SOLIX E10 Power Module Inverter

Anker SOLIX B6000 Battery Module

With the Power Dock or Smart Inlet Box, the SOLIX E10 can back up every circuit in a typical house, so you are not choosing between the fridge and the router. It is engineered to start and run a full-size 5-ton central A/C by handling the high inrush current that usually trips smaller systems, which matters when a summer outage hits during a heatwave.

Anker SOLIX Power Dock

Anker SOLIX Smart Inlet

When the grid fails, the lights stay on without flickering, the Wi-Fi does not reboot, and the A/C keeps humming. The system switches over in under 20 milliseconds, fast enough that most electronics never even notice. The feeling is less about the exact speed and more about the house simply not going dark anymore, even when the neighborhood does and trees are still down.

The SOLIX E10 can watch the weather and charge itself ahead of a predicted storm through its Storm Guard feature, so you are not caught with half-full batteries when the first tree hits a line. The modular packs give enough headroom for multi-day outages, while the forecasting takes backup power from a reactive scramble to a quiet ritual where the system prepares itself before you think to check.

Anker SOLIX Smart Generator 5500

The optional smart generator stretches backup power through long outages without running nonstop. Instead of charging through AC conversion, it feeds the batteries directly over DC, which Anker claims is up to five times more fuel-efficient than a traditional setup. It runs when needed, rests at night, and feels more like part of a system than a last-resort accessory.

The SOLIX E10 is not only for rare blackouts. On normal days, it can store cheap off-peak energy or excess solar and run the house when rates spike, trimming bills. Each unit accepts up to about 9 kW of solar input, so a rooftop array keeps the batteries topped up, and the system prioritizes important circuits to keep essentials alive longer during outages.

The hardware is a family of clean, stackable modules, with batteries that can be wall-mounted or floor-standing as the setup grows. The core units use an all-metal NEMA 4 enclosure and are certified to UL 9540 and UL 9540A, signaling they are built to live outdoors, handle bad weather, and meet the toughest residential safety standards.

Power anxiety is real, the feeling that one bad storm could wipe out food, work, and comfort for days. An outage where the house stays lit, the air stays cool, and the fridge keeps humming while the street outside goes dark is the payoff Anker SOLIX E10 is built around, making blackouts feel like minor blips instead of household emergencies.

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This DIY Wooden Battery Charger Brings Dead AAs Back to Life

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Most homes accumulate a drawer full of dead AA and AAA batteries, and the uneasy feeling of tossing heavy little cylinders into recycling or the trash. Alkaline cells are marketed as single-use, even though the chemistry can often be coaxed back to life with the right kind of intervention. RegenBox 1 is a small, hands-on challenge to that throwaway logic, turning battery regeneration into a bench-top ritual that requires patience, measurement, and a soldering iron.

RegenBox 1 is a kit that arrives as a flat collection of components, a printed circuit board, electronic parts, and laser-cut wooden panels. Once assembled, it becomes a USB-powered regenerator for AA and AAA alkaline batteries, designed for electronics hobbyists rather than casual users. The wooden case and visible PCB make it feel more like a lab instrument or workshop project than a sealed plastic charger, and building it yourself is half the point.

Designer: Regenbox

Assembly requires a soldering iron and solder, a voltmeter, flat-nose pliers, wire cutters, and a small screwdriver, plus some electronics confidence. The kit supplies the PCB, resistors, diodes, LEDs, IC, battery holders, USB cable, and the wooden enclosure. You are not just buying a gadget, you are learning how it works as you put it together, turning the components into a functional regenerator that can sit on your desk or workbench for years.

Using it starts with testing each alkaline cell with a voltmeter. Below 0.9 V goes to recycling, 0.9 V to 1.35 V is a candidate for regeneration, and 1.35 V to 1.5 V is already reusable. Once cells are slotted in and the USB 5 V input is connected, the circuit feeds very low current for 8 to 24 hours, slowly reversing part of the discharge without stressing the casing or causing leaks.

The boundaries are strict, alkaline only, no lithium, no damaged or leaking cells, correct polarity, and room-temperature use. The red and orange LEDs indicate current flow and help with diagnostics, but the real discipline is in measuring voltages before and after, and respecting the chemistry. It is not a fast charger; it is a patient tool that trades speed for safety and extended second lives.

Getting one or more extra cycles out of batteries that would otherwise be discarded adds up across a household or community. The open, repairable design invites modification and learning, turning energy use into something you can see and tweak. RegenBox 1 becomes a quiet protest against sealed, opaque devices, and a small workshop ally for anyone trying to reduce waste while gaining control over the objects they depend on.

RegenBox 1 changes the way you look at dead alkalines. Instead of being the end of the story, they become candidates for triage, measurement, and careful regeneration. The wooden box on the bench is a reminder that design can intervene not just at the point of purchase, but at the moment we usually give up on an object, asking whether it really needs to be thrown away yet or if a slow, gentle charge might bring it back for another round.

The post This DIY Wooden Battery Charger Brings Dead AAs Back to Life first appeared on Yanko Design.

Duracell Portable Power Stations are like gigantic alkaline batteries

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We’ve seen our fair share of portable power stations, and most of them roughly share the same designs. They come in rectangular box shapes and bear rugged materials, which makes it easier to transport them from place to place if needed. There isn’t any rule that says they have to be made that way, though, especially if you’re willing to skimp a little on the battery capacity to add some style and flourish. For example, Duracell, a name long associated with batteries, has had the rather amusing idea to pay homage to its most popular product line, resulting in portable power stations, or extra large power banks, that look like overgrown D-size batteries, with a few tricks up their sleeves that add some flavor to a normally boring piece of tech.

Designer: Duracell

There was a time when consumer electronics revolved around these cylindrical batteries that had to be thrown away once they lost their charges forever. We’ve thankfully mostly moved on from these wasteful energy sources, replacing them with rechargeable and reusable variants, but there’s still a certain fondness attached to the image of these old alkaline batteries that have become icons of their kind, just like floppy disks. Riding on the nostalgia trend these days, Duracell had the clever idea to put that iconic design on a portable power station, almost like a tongue-in-cheek joke on these extra-large batteries.

The Duracell M250 and M150 both look like giant D batteries, complete with a black and bronze color scheme and a smaller disc shape on top that designates the positive end of the cylinder. They’re rather small compared to most portable power stations but also considerably larger than even the largest power bank. The size differences are quite understandable considering these two only have 60,000mAh and 25,000mAh battery capacities for the M250 and M150, respectively, though those are enough to charge most electronic devices, including a laptop via the 100W USB-C port. The larger Duracell M250 even has a 100W AC port for other use cases.

The portable power stations have more than just looks, though. That protruding disc at the top actually functions as a MagSafe-compatible 15W wireless charger, and you can lift that top lid to tilt an iPhone or iPad to the desired angle so you can watch your screen even while charging. Tilting that cover also reveals a small storage compartment for cables and chargers, things you’d want to keep near the power station. To charge the power station itself, you’d have to put it on the included dock, an elegant solution that unfortunately means having to carry a separate part with you on your trips.

Admittedly, this traditional battery form is not the most space-efficient shape for traveling, putting the “portable” part of its name into question. Still, there’s no argument that it’s an interesting design for a portable power station, putting an almost poetic spin on the product category. It will definitely be an eye-catching presence in coffee shops or even on planes, though interest could turn into derision when you start fumbling to put the large can in your bag or luggage.

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