Apple may still release its AirPower wireless charging mat that was cancelled roughly a year ago.
Apple first announced the AirPower mat in September 2017, promising it would be released by the end of 2018. By March of 2019, AirPower was still a no-show and the company finally called it off, saying it would not release the product.
According to a tweet by Jon Prosser, founder of the YouTube channel Front Page Tech, Apple is still working on AirPower and has been trying to solve some of the issues that caused the company to initially cancel the project.
AirPower isn’t dead
The project is back on, internally. No guarantee that they’ll finalize and release it, but they haven’t given up yet and they’re trying to re-engineer the coils to displace heat more effectively. Prototyping is underway.
— Jon Prosser (@jon_prosser) 3/22/20
MacRumors reported that noted Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has said the company would release a “smaller wireless charging mat” in the first half of 2020. He did not say whether the new mat was the AirPower, or some other project Apple is working on. Either way, it seems that Apple users may be able to buy a wireless charger of some kind from Apple in the near future, rather than relying on third-party solutions.