![]() ![]() And iPhone is something that we should consider an electronic device as opposed to an electrical device. Let’s use an American piece of equipment traveling overseas to paint the picture, and let’s make it an iPhone because they’re so ubiquitous. Transform Your Devicesīefore you go and buy a travel adapter for every single one of your electronic devices and electrical appliances, it’s important to understand some of the more volatile differences between your country’s power supply and those where you intend to travel. ![]() The whole affair can get a little confusing, however, so here's an equally confusing map. Others are more interchangeable or universal, depending largely on how much you want to spend. Some adapters are country specific, meaning that they’re built to receive one specific kind of plug and convert it to fit another specific kind of outlet. On the other end are prongs outfitted for one or more different styles of international outlet, allowing you to take an American plug and insert it into a European outlet, or a British plug and insert it into an Australian outlet. What a travel plug adapter does, quite simply, is to take whatever plug you need to insert into an outlet and receive it on one end. ![]() In most of Europe, however, those two vertically oriented rectangles become two circles, and there’s an entire lexicon of insults around trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, so we know that’s not going to work. In the US, for example, ungrounded outlets contain two vertically oriented, rectangular slots that correspond to an American plug’s two vertically oriented rectangular prongs. The most obvious problem you’ll encounter when trying to use international outlets with a domestic plug is a stark difference in shape. If you so much as mention the desire to travel to another country to someone who’s been literally anywhere outside your country of origin, you’re probably going to get your fair share of advice as well. Long before I ever traveled overseas, I received my fair share of warnings regarding the differences between electrical power supplies in the US and those abroad. One negativism in the safety department that might be worth mentioning is the unfortunate absence of a grounding prong on the Kikkerland UL03-A, which prevents the device from passing along short-circuit protection to its connected loads. The Pac2Go All-In-One even comes with an extra fuse. Safety: Often, these adapters will be the last line of defense between your devices and electrical catastrophe, so it’s nice that many of them have integrated fuses into their design, to protect against overcurrent and overheating conditions. The Loop World 3.0 and the Saunorch High Speed have retractable prongs, so you never need to worry about them bending over, and the Poweradd Second Generation and Pac2Go All-In-One come with carrying cases for extra cushioning. ![]() Portability: For the most part, offerings in this category are designed small enough to easily fit into most suitcases or carry-on luggage, but some options have taken extra steps to improve their portability. Larger options like the Bestek Voltage Converter feature multiple AC outlets, and still ample space for USB devices. Compact devices like the Loop World 3.0 are nice, but they only offer you one AC outlet, which might be ok if most of your devices charge via USB, but it also might amount to a real pain for you. Consider how many outlets you’re likely to need before making your final decision to purchase. We also added the Saunorch High Speed to the top of our list, impressed among other things by its USB-C charge port, as this style of cable continues to become more ubiquitous.Ī few things to think about while you shop the category:Ĭapacity: There are few things more frustrating than juggling multiple devices when you’ve only got a single charge port and you’re in a rush. However, we did remove the Bestek Smart Charge due to availability issues, and we replaced our previous Poweradd ranking with the Poweradd Second Generation, a newer model that comes with a convenient carrying case and improved USB charging speed. Our previous picks for this category held reasonably true during this round of updates. We favored the Worldwide over the 2107, because it has a USB-C port, but both units offer four USB-A ports, serviceable carrying cases, overcurrent protection via fuse, and onboard storage for a spare fuse - which is a nice touch if you blow your original in a remote location. In their places, we added the Epicka Worldwide and the Bonaker 2107. Both of these choices were still fine selections, but we felt that their offering of two USB ports was limiting. However, we did end up phasing out the Kensington International and Loop World LE-TA01. It was a fairly uneventful round of updates, with all our picks from last year still holding strong. ![]()
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