The best portable chargers and power banks in 2024

The best portable chargers keep your electronics powered while you're out and about. These handy peripherals can charge a wide range of devices, including smartphones, tablets, wireless earbuds, and even some laptops. Because you'll inevitably find yourself with low battery life when outdoors, you'll need a reliable portable charger to keep your electronics going. Not having one could prove to be extremely inconvenient.

We've done a battery (pun intended) of tests on some of the most highly-rated portable chargers on the market. To that end, we've pulled from both big brands and popular competitors. While these specific portable chargers regularly appear on bestseller lists, they're all different in several important ways.

We've got these best portable chargers ranked in order of what we would buy, with shoutouts for the best portable charger, our favorite budget charger, and the best portable charger for iPhone.

The quick list

Here's a quick overview of the best portable chargers you can buy right now based on our testing and reviews.

John Velasco

John is a senior editor for mobile covering phones, accessories, chargers, smart home devices, and EVs. During his off-hours, John enjoys using smart telescopes for astrophotography, doing lawn work on the weekends, and trying to get his two cats Instagram famous. He's also been on YouTube for 15+ years doing hosting duties and his work has appeared in publications such as PhoneArena, Digital Trends, SPY, and Android Authority.

The best portable chargers you can buy today

The best portable charger overall

Anker’s well known for its lineup of power solutions, so it comes at no surprise that the Anker Prime 20,000 mAh power bank tops our list of best portable chargers. With its generous battery capacity, it’s more than capable of charging small stuff like your phones and wearables — but it’s also powerful enough to charge laptops too.

What makes it better is that it features a maximum charging speed of 200W, which is ridiculously fast if your device can support it. For fast charging phones, it could take 30 minutes or less to get it back up to 100% capacity. Meanwhile, the unit itself charges at a speedy rate of 100W. There’s also a handy display that shows its charging capacity and the actual speeds it’s charging with its USB ports.

The best budget portable charger

Although it might not be as familiar a brand, the INIU 10000 mAh charger is the best budget portable charger with its affordable cost. You won’t spend a whole lot picking it up either, since it frequently gets discounted to get it down to around $20, which is super cheap compared to the other options.

This INIU charger stood up in 15-minute and 1-hour timed charging (at 22%, 78%), with times that were within 1-2 percentage points ahead of what we got out of comparable Anker PowerCore Slim's times. Even with its ultra affordable cost, we’re glad that INIU offers a 3-year limited warranty — which is more than the usual 1-year that other battery bank makers offer.

The best portable charger for iPhone

There’s something to say about MagSafe. It lends a helping hand with the mophie Snap+ Juice Pack Mini in keeping it fastened snugly on the back of a compatible iPhone with MagSafe for on-the-go charging. That way, you can always have it on hand — even when you need to top it off while waiting for your coffee in the morning.

With its 5,000 mAh battery, it’s able to provide nearly a full charge to most iPhones, but there’s also a USB-C port on hand to charge other phones and gadgets.

The best portable charger for travel

You just neve know what can arise when you’re vacationing or traveling, which is why the Scosche PowerUp 600 is the perfect companion to keep your gadgets charged. There’s a 5,400 mAh battery capable of speedily charging phones with its 10W charging speed.

However, its value in being a portable charger for travel is its unique ability to jumpstart a dead car battery. The last thing you need to worry about while traveling is a disabled vehicle, but you can save yourself time and heartache by bringing it back to life with the Scosche PowerUp 600.

The best portable charger for Apple Watch

One of the most versatile portable chargers out there, the Satechi Quatro Wireless Power Bank, doesn’t just have enough fuel in the tank to charge all of your gadgets wired or wirelessly with its beefy 10,000 mAh battery, but it also packs an Apple Watch charger that lets you conveniently charge on the go.

This means you won’t have to remember to bring along your Apple Watch charger since it integrates one, which helps to save you space in your bag — and it also means less clutter when you have to charge. With its 18W charging speeds, it’s fast enough to give you a decent charge in a short amount of time.

The best Anker portable charger

Versatility is what the Anker Power Bank Fusion 10K is all about. That’s because this portable charger from Anker doesn’t force you to bring along other cables and adapters to use it. With its integrated USB-C cable, it packs 30W wired speeds that’s fast enough to power some laptops in addition to phones. You can also lean on its other USB-C port to charge another device simultaneously with its 10,000 mAh battery cell.

Recharging the Anker Power Bank Fusion 10K is also a cinch because it features a built-in foldable charger when the battery itself needs to be recharged. With this setup, you might not even have to worry about bringing any of your chargers and cables because it conveniently packages everything into its design.

The best portable charger for camping

The Jackery Explorer 100 Plus is the perfect portable charger for camping because of how it packs a large battery that could get you days of powering your gadgets, without being too heavy to carry around. With its 128W charging speeds, it doesn't take all that long to charge smaller gadgets like phones and smartwatches. At the same time, that fast charging speed can also recharge laptops and MacBooks with ease.

For camping, the Jackery Explorer 100 Plus features a design that's shock and fire-resistant. And due to how it's still incredibly compact, it's not as burdensome like other traditional power stations that weight 10+ pounds. And finally, you can also get the optional compact sized solar panel to recharge it on days when it's sunny while you're camping, which is perfect when there are no outlets around.

The best solar charger

At some point a portable charger's going to need to be recharged. With the Mregb Solar Power Bank, however, you may never have to connect it to a wall charger again because it features an integrated solar panel to charge its massive 42,800 mAh battery.

Its rugged design also makes it the ultimate portable charger of choice among survivalists who don't have access to an outlet for long stretches of time. While it packs a lot of utility, including two USB-C ports, it's one of the slowest charging options based on our testing. In fact, it takes 25 minutes to charge an iPhone 15 Plus back up to 25%.

Obviously, this shouldn't pose a problem if you're not too concerned about charging speeds, especially when it can charge itself with nothing more than sun power.

How to choose the best portable charger

Finding the right charger capacity: You'll often see a four to five-digit number, with the letters mAh following it, and that's your first big indicator of how much this charger is right for you. If you're constantly refueling your phone and other gadgets, go for at least 10,000mAh. For each extra device you charge, add at least 5,000 to the mAh rating you're looking for. Just need to prevent your device from hitting 0 on late nights out? You'll be good with something in the under 5,000 mAh rating, provided you remember to charge it often.

Be a ports authority: If you hold onto your devices forever, and don't already know what a USB-C port is, you can probably just get whatever fits your price. But if you're the kind who wants faster charging, look for a brick that has PD in its name. The best portable chargers, at least for my money, charge devices the fastest and use the Power Delivery (PD) standard. Also, their USB-C ports mean you can refuel these power banks with the same cords used to charge modern laptops.

Utility to meet the demand: You just never know what needs charging. Whether it's your phone, wireless earbuds, or some other gadget, a portable charger needs to have the utility to meet the demand. That's why it's also good to look out for power banks that have other ports besides USB-C and charging pads on them.

Charging speeds matter: Having a huge battery is wonderful to get more charges in before the battery bank needs its own recharge, but it's also good to look at its charging speed. Faster charging speeds means your device will go from empty to full in a shorter amount of time. You'll want to look at 30W charging speeds at the very least.

How we test the best portable chargers

You want a charger that was put through the rigors of refueling, so we did just that. With timers in hand, we kept draining an iPhone 15 Plus to 5% capacity and then timed how much time it took for each power bank to refuel it to 25% and 50% — all while keeping the display off on the iPhone 15 Plus.

Our ranking also factored in the portability and designs of each model, as especially small and pocket-friendly chargers can't physically store as many mAh of battery power as their larger brethren. Similarly, the smaller a charger is, the less likely it has more than two ports (one for gaining a charge, the other for giving power).

Those looking to keep their tech protected throughout each and every charge should check out our guide to the best surge protectors.