Up close with the "official" Apple Watch magnetic charging dock
There are no shortage of charging docks for the Apple Watch, but here's the official one from Apple. Is it worth buying? Let's take a quick look to find out.
The Apple Watch magnetic charging dock is well-made and a great accessory to your Apple watch.
Shortly after the Apple Watch was announced, specialized charging docks for it started flying onto store shelves. Accessories for Apple products is a big business, plus, let’s face it, the charging cable that came with the Apple Watch isn’t exactly the most elegant, especially in the face of some of the third-party charging docks we have seen.
The Apple Watch magnetic charging dock looks like a white hockey puck.
It might have taken awhile, but Apple has finally released their own charging dock for the Apple Watch. The design is simple and elegant. It comes in white and is shaped in a disc with the magnetic charging puck in the center. The top is covered in a soft white leather-like material that feels similar to Apple’s own iPad covers, while the bottom is lined with microfiber to ensure that the charging dock doesn’t move about too freely. It connects to a Lightning cable which can be plugged into any USB port or a USB power adapter to charge. However, Apple doesn’t provide an additional USB power adapter with this dock, so you’d have to make do with the one that came with your Apple Watch.
Like the Apple Watch, the magnetic charging dock is extremely well built. The hinge is thick and the stainless steel surrounds are mirror polished.
The charging puck is on a thick, sturdy hinge which can be lifted up through a cutout in the bottom to let users charge their Apple Watch in Nightstand mode. This is probably the biggest attraction for users as few Apple Watch charging docks out there now allow the watch to be charged in Nightstand mode. It can also be pushed back down easily if users prefer to charge their watches in a flat position. Because of this unique design, the charging dock will work well with both open and closed band types.
The biggest draw of the Apple Watch magnetic charging dock is that you can use charge your Apple Watch in Nightstand mode. Not many docks let you do that.
You can use the dock easily with open and closed style watch bands.
As you would expect from an official Apple accessory, the new Apple Watch magnetic charging dock is really well made and quite nifty to use. But like all other official Apple accessories, this magnetic charging dock is really pricey too. At S$118, it is considerably pricier than most third-party stands, but it’s really nice to have and would make a great gift this holiday season for any Apple Watch owner.
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