There has been a lot of confusion over the past couple of days regarding wireless charging support on the Pixel Watch, and Google has finally set the record straight. Outside of the official charger, the Pixel Watch can’t charge anything else.
Like smartwatches from Samsung and Apple, the Pixel Watch uses a version of wireless charging to drain its battery without the need for exposed pins or real-estate-heavy ports, but because of its internal coil size, which makes it hard to guarantee. Compatibility with other Qi devices.
At the Pixel Watch launch event, Google confirmed that the watch won’t support the Pixel Stand – we thought it was a reasonable loss, given the form factor of this charger and the size of the watch. But as it turns out, you can’t really expect a good charging experience anywhere except for the official charger.
In a statement to 9to5Google This afternoon, Google confirmed that the Pixel Watch does not support Qi wireless charging pads or Reverse wireless charging for Pixel smartphone.
Qi charging is not supported on Google Pixel Watch. There may be some charging configurations where reverse wireless charging or Qi charging appears to work. This will be device and charger specific and cannot guarantee consistent, stable or strong charging. Note that in some cases, this may cause the device to discharge while on the charger. Pixel Watch supports charging only with the provided inbox charger.
We, and several others, found in initial testing that reverse wireless charging and some other charging pads triggered the charging notification on the Pixel Watch, apparently unlike Google support page In which he says:
Reverse wireless charging from Pixel phones is not supported.
But after this initial confirmation of charging, it quickly becomes clear that charging is not actually happening. In our own tests earlier todayWe found that the Pixel Watch will do just that Discharge If it’s placed on the back of the Pixel 7 Pro or Galaxy Z Fold 4 in reverse wireless charging modes, exactly in line with what Google has confirmed.
Related: Google Pixel Watch Initial Review: Expect disappointment, you’ll never be disappointed
The problem here is that there is no indication of this on the Pixel Watch itself.
The watch shows charging is on, with no indication that it isn’t actually working. This indicator does not change even if the watch is discharged. Hopefully Google will change that in a future update. On top of that, we certainly hope that future Pixel Watch or Pixel models will launch support for reverse wireless charging — Samsung has figured this out with their watches and phones.
As it stands, anything but the official charger will be a “your results may vary” status. But, in our tests so far, it really does appear that nothing actually works.
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