EU sets December 2024 deadline for common charger directive on phone OEMs

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The European Union (EU) has set a firm deadline for phone manufacturers, to adhere to the common charger directive. The new directive seeks to implement one common standard for all devices that use wired charging.

Device manufacturers have till December 28th, 2024 to ensure that they support wired charging through the USB Type-C port.

The EU said that member states have until December 28th, 2023 to publish regulations for governance of this directive, and they will mandatorily start applying these rules, a year later in 2024.

According to The Verge, laptop manufacturers may be given a longer rope. They need to switch over to USB Type-C by April 2026. The directive will also enforce same charging speeds on all fast chargers.

Apple has begrudgingly agreed to comply to the directive but it remains to be seen if they switch over to USB Type-C for Europe or just use wireless charging for the region, since that has no restrictions.

Apple Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo tweeted that the move to USB Type-C might happen sooner than later in 2023, where he says that Apple will switch all iPhone's over to USB Type-C by the end of next year.

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My latest survey indicates that 2H23 new iPhone will abandon Lightning port and switch to USB-C port. USB-C could improve iPhone's transfer and charging speed in hardware designs, but the final spec details still depend on iOS support.

— 郭明錤 (Ming-Chi Kuo) (@mingchikuo) May 11, 2022