Does your non Apple brand wall charger charge over 1Amp?

[tundra12]

I have an iPhone 8 with various chargers at home. The stock 1A 5W charger, an iPad 2.1A 12W charger, an original Samsung S7 charger that does 9V 1.67A or 5V 2A and another generic 2.1A charger.

With the stock 5W charger I get 0.97A measured with my USB meter, 2A with iPad charger, and 0.98A with Samsung charger, and 0.98A with the generic charger.

Any idea why the ipad charger can charge greater than 1A but the samsung and generic charger will not?

 

[cynics]

USB specifications.

First it should be mentioned there are natural limitations with battery charging. The more a battery is charged the more resistant it becomes to being charged. So as battery fills up current (amps) will reduce. There are also artificial limitations where the device itself will limit the charging rate to avoid harming the battery as it fills. This is why manufacturers advertise 0-80% in X minutes, because after that it slows down. So any testing will need to be done at a low battery percentage.

The .98 amp you are seeing is likely the USB 3.0 900mA (.9 amp) limit with a variance in voltage. 5 watts @ 5.10 volts (voltage being the variance) = .98amps.

To exceed USB spec limitations the charger and device need to be compatible with exceeding those specs and they will have an initial handshake. Qualcomms fast charge for example uses a higher voltage which could damage many USB devices but if the charger and device do not agree on the higher voltage specs it defaults and stays at 5 volt.

For a generic charger to exceed 5 watt (5 volt x 1 amp = 5 watt) with an Apple device it will need have the BC 1.2 spec. BC = Battery Charge which is a specification of USB. Even then it will depend on the device though. I have this USB charging station and it will charge my iPads @ 2 amp (10 watt), iPhone 6S @ 1.5 amp (7.5 watt) and my iPhone 5S @ 1 amp (5 watt).

tl;dr - Yes, but only chargers that meet Apples USB charging specs that allow exceeding USB standards.