USB-C 2.1 cables for 240W power delivery are here

Last May, it was revealed that the upcoming 2.1 standard for USB-C would improve the power output of the tech to allow cables to charge powerful devices like gaming laptops and 4K monitors. It allows cables to go up to 240W for the first time, and now we’re beginning to see the first compatible cables land. You can’t yet buy these cables, but this is the first time we've seen a retailer talk about its 240W options.

Spotted by Tom’s Hardware, a retailer called Club3D in the US has begun advertising a series of three cables that can deliver 240W of power. Two of these are made for transmitting power, data, and video, with the top-end model offering a data throughput of 40 Gbps. That'll allow for transmitting 8K 60fps video. The third cable option is built for power and USB 2.0 data, so it's far less useful for data transfer than the other two options.

Introducing these cables is a big step forward for those who want to use one cable to power everything from their headphones through to a gaming laptop from a single charger. There are still a few hurdles before you can use cables like this. First up, Club3D has yet to put these on sale, and we expect these to be expensive when they are available. Secondly, there aren’t any charging bricks compatible with this technology right now. We'll have to wait to see those hit shop shelves before you can fully make the most of this tech.

This has been chiefly posited as an improvement for USB-C to power a variety of devices, but it may be that we see the fast charging on smartphones improve through this as well. The world's fastest charging phone is currently the 120W Vivo iQOO 7. However, Oppo has revealed its 240W fast-charging tech that it plans to feature on an upcoming phone.

Oppo has no word when this tech will be available, but it claims it can charge a 4,500mAh battery in just nine minutes. Expect to see this technology become more of the norm over the next few years, but it'll still be a long time before this is commonplace on smartphones.

:story: Android Police