Oppo’s VOOC Flash Charge gets smarter and safer for fast-charging
Oppo’s VOOC Flash Charge gets smarter and safer for fast-charging
Oppo’s foray into its fast-charging technology, VOOC Flash Charge, isn’t as flashy as its phones. However, incremental upgrades since its inception in 2014 have made the technology one of the most impressive and effective smartphone fast-charging technologies. For example, last year’s announcement saw Oppo bringing us 125W fast charging.
Here are some of the latest upgrades announced at its Oppo Flash Charge Open Day (27 July 2021).
Fuse with lower impedance: an upgraded fuse design offers lower internal resistance and improved performance. As implied, the lower impedance makes it more efficient at charging while doing what fuses should - stopping dangerous charge when there’s an electric overload.
Gallium Nitride (GaN) switches: while not a new implementation, Oppo is actively using GaN switches for its phones now. This was made possible by reducing the amount of space required for GaN switches, making it possible to have smaller GaN adapters for mobiles.
Internal series bi-cell design: by implementing dual battery cells into a series bi-cell design, batteries can now take up less physical space while offering 5% more capacity with no trade-offs to its battery safety.
Battery Safety Detection Chip: Oppo’s latest safety chip can detect external damage and recognise voltage drops in real-time.
Composite Current Collector: the battery now uses a new but unspecified composite material slotted between two aluminium layers to create a five-layer composite current collector structure. Oppo’s new structure showed 100% success rates in puncture and collision tests conducted in Oppo’s testing labs.
A current collector is what bridges the external circuits to a lithium-ion battery. Traditional current collector structures use aluminium or copper components.
These advancements are nice and all, but what new perks do VOOC Flash Charge users get? Oppo said that the improvements to its smart-charging technology saw:
- Longer battery life: for 65W SuperVOOC, the battery can now maintain 80% of its original capacity after 1,500 cycles.
- Improved charging speed in specific scenarios: 65W SuperVOOC can increase its charging speed by 20% safely, which allows a 4,500mAh phone to reach 100% charge in 30 minutes when needed. Oppo didn’t really specify what these ‘scenarios’ are, however.
- Balancing charging speed against phone temperature: SuperVOOC users can comfortably use their phones while charging.
In addition to these new perks, Oppo is exploring tech for fast charging in extreme conditions. One field they’re working on is fast-charging lithium-ion batteries in extreme cold. Oppo’s tests have shown that they can normally charge batteries even in temperatures between -20°C to -10°C.
Source: Oppo