On these special dates, it’s likely that you found an iPhone 15 as a gift under the Christmas tree. The latest Apple device presented in September 2023 includes one of the most important innovations from Apple in recent times and that is the integration of USB-C as charging and data transfer connector. The Lightning connector is therefore removed 10 years after its birth with the iPhone 5 in 2012. Below we show you what accessories can you connect to USB-C to take full advantage of the virtues of this connector.
Hint
The main differences between USB-C and Lightning
Apple made the jump to the Lightning connector after having the 30-pin connector. Lightning has been one of the recognizable elements of the Big Apple world for years to the point where we could not charge an Apple device if we did not have a charger with this connector. This significantly limited users’ daily lives when the iPhone and iPad were not so widespread around the world.
As we mentioned earlier, Lightning was a cable created by and for Apple devices. This is a connector reversible with which a large number of devices could be charged. However, after USB-C was replaced on Macs and iPads, Lightning was only present on iPhones, which ended last September with the launch of the iPhone 15. Additionally, the Lightning connector was much smaller than its predecessor: the 30-pin connector. It also stood out for its ability to transfer data, in addition to charging devices. But the main disadvantage, as we said, is that It wasn’t a universal charger and USB-C came along to change that.
USB-C has reversible capacity, like Lightning, in addition to being a multi-purpose charger which not only charges devices but also transfers data, produces video and audio output from the device, etc. On another side, Transfer speeds are higher, supporting speeds of up to 10Gbps and even more so among new generations. In addition to normal charging, this connector is compatible with fast charging protocols which allow you to have a large amount of battery in less time.
What can be connected to the USB-C of the iPhone 15?
The importance of USB-C lies in the multiple possibility of connecting accessories of different types and with very different functions. Let’s take a brief look at all the potential of USB-C on the iPhone 15.
Universal charging with just one cable
Obviously, this point had to be included in this article. The iPhone 15 has USB-C, and you probably have USB-C cables at home because you own a Mac or iPad Pro or another non-Apple device such as an Android phone. The universality of USB-C allows us to charge iPhone 15 and other devices with any cable such as AirPods with the USB-C box, the latest generation Apple TV remote control, etc.
It is important to emphasize that to charge iPhone 15 at maximum speed It is necessary to have a 20 or 30 volt power adapter. You can use a larger capacity adapter like that of the Mac and the iPhone 15 will take care of optimizing and managing the charge.
You can enjoy reading this article where we explain how to spot fake cables thanks to Apple’s MFI certificate which accredits the quality standards required by the Big Apple.
How to tell if a cable is official or Apple MFI certified
Transfer your iPhone 15 battery to other devices
The iPhone 15 also has another virtue and that is that Allows you to charge other devices with the iPhone 15 battery. That is, we can connect a cable to charge products that generate a charge of 4.5 volts. This can allow us to charge the case of some AirPods, charge another iPhone or even give a little extra battery to our iPad or other device, even if they are not from Apple.
More hardware to power the iPhone 15
But we can not only use the iPhone 15 and USB-C to charge the device but also to connect it equipment of all kinds: keyboards, mice, headphones, etc. Almost all accessories that connect via USB-C will have functionality on the iPhone 15 without the need to install drivers or anything like that: plug in and use. Some interesting examples could be headphones, microphones, lights, USB-C to Ethernet adapters to provide an Internet connection to a device or a keyboard to generate music directly from our iPhone.
Manage your hard drive data directly from your new iPhone
If you have a hard drive or external memory with USB-C, you are also in luck because thanks to the application Files we can access the contents of these external memories. And not only that, but we can import files to iPhone, add new ones to hard drives and much more.
Connect your iPhone 15 to an external display
Finally, another accessory to which we can connect our iPhone 15 via USB-C is an external screen. We can send our screen content directly to a screen using a USB-C to HDMI cable compatible with our iPhone. Thanks to this system we can duplicate the screen of our iPhone and be able to enjoy content directly on the monitor.
On Apple’s official website we have a large number of cable accessories to perform each of the functions described, but almost any USB-C compatible cable or accessory will be directly compatible with the iPhone 15. so sometimes you won’t have to spend so much money on Apple’s official website have a working cable.
Table of Contents
