Notable Changes to Anker Website | Phasing Out Chargers?

[Insider]

Anker’s website has recently undergone a notable layout change, which may represent a significant shift in the company’s focus.

The following changes have occurred in the bar along the top of the page.

• “Power Banks” has disappeared and can now be found under “Other Products”
• “Chargers” has moved from second to third
• “Cables” has disappeared and can now be found under “Other Products”
• “Hub” has appeared (could previously be found under “Other Products”)
• “Power Strips” has appeared (could previously be found under “Other Products”)

Over the past few years, Anker has publicly acknowledged that they expect the market for portable chargers – and chargers in general – to decrease in the future, thanks to improving battery technology. This marks the first sign of that statement coming to fruition.

However, those who have payed close attention probably already noticed the shift.

Although Anker released a wall charger with dual USB-C ports last April and a car charger with multiple USB-C ports last June, they have yet to release a portable charger with more than one USB-C port.

In addition, Anker launched a wall charger with PowerIQ 3.0 last May and its first car charger with the new tech last June, but has yet to release a portable charger with PowerIQ 3.0.

This makes sense. The decline of portable chargers is more imminent than that of wall or car chargers. However, change can still be frustrating for consumers.

Well, what do YOU think? Please voice your opinion with a reply!

I question the sustainability of hubs just as much or more than that of power banks, but maybe that’s just me…

[Momo_Bobo]

I remember buying a replacement swappable battery for my galaxy s1 back in the day by Anker, those days are over. Anker makes solid products and I hope they can continue to innovate and develop new categories to expand their catalog in order to stay relevant.

I wonder what will be next, very excited but concerned.

Thanks for pointing out the changes

[professor]

I’d not read too much into this, if they’re that bothered about websites they’d update them to keep current with Amazon.

I don’t see powerbanks going away until battery technology improves even more. Plenty of the powerbanks I gifted to people are being used to keep a 2 year old phone to last through the day, the battery not surviving the rest of the phone longevity.

I think hubs are a symptom people bought the wrong laptop product, with Wifi and Bluetooth and Cloud, replacing wired. I have a USB3 Type A powered hub for my Raspberry Pi as it can’t power more than 1 external drive itself and a Chromebook needed A to Ethernet adapter. That’s all I needed for the last 5 years.

[TechMan]

Astute observations.

I also think we will see a decline in Hubs, as everything slowly moves towards USB-C.

[professor]

Reall?

I think USB-C will increase hubs because there’s power and bandwidth through USB-C more than A and so laptop designers figuring intead of needing 2-3 Type-A for external keyboard, mouse, storage, they can get by with 1 or 2 Type-C. I think one C on left and one on right will end up the most typical.

But the requirement for port count is coming down, BT 5, faster Wifi, is meaning people backing up less to USB storage and connecting fewer things.

I can see port-less devices coming down the line, so hubs have nothing to connect to. Graphene batteries and they solve the battery heat aging problem which then lets wireless charging have fewer downsides. A Qi 30W pad you put your laptop on, I see within 2 years.

[TechMan]

Eventually we will have extrernal mice, keyboard and storage will all connect through USB-C, so there will be no need for USB-A ports

[professor]

There’s no need for Type A now. It’s just straddling, say older storage on newer laptops.

If someone wanted to they can be totally Type C today, although it’s difficult with Anker who is very slow to adopt.

But to the thread, I see on the one hand the cause of hubs being laptops going to just one or two Type C, offloading the port count problem to the consumer, countered by the fact you struggle to need to connect much anyway now.

I connected my 500GB Seagate Type A hdd to my 5 year old laptop to backup my Virtualbox Windows 7 yesterday. That was the most recent physical connection other than power I used within the last year. I was getting write speeds about 17MB/s which is about the same speed as my 5Ghz Wifi. My phone is on unlimited LTE and it’s getting about the same 18MB/s cellular.

Where I am seeing the most use of hubs is in the tech journalist who shoot 4K video and need wired speed to transfer to a processor-powerful device for video editing. Aside from that I very rarely see physical connections other than power. And power is going wireless during 2020/1 so I see even less wires coming.

[TechMan]

I think the only thing that I use regularly from anker that doesn’t have type c, is my bolder flashlight. My earbuds, TWS earbuds, main speakers and powercore all have type c.

[professor]

Right, we share the fact Anker’s devices causes us to straddle Type A for longer. My bedside lamp is broke and I’m using an LC40 as an evening light as lockdown is making buying things harder. Yes, Anker flashlights MicroB. Grrrr.

[ikari04warrior]

Nice catch! Haven’t visited Anker’s website in a while

[Mark_Dunsmore]

I noticed that last week, and thought it was very odd that I had to hunt for the cables and powerbanks.

[Shenoy]

I have not really paid much attention to the Anker site lately since I mostly check Anker products on Amazon.

But looks like Anker website has revamped a lot…

Good questions!

[Ice1]

May be it’s the shift Anker taking right now.

[jercox]

Every external mouse and keyboard I have is still USB-A, and I think the trend is to take those wireless (Bluetooth LE) over moving them to USB-C.

I also find myself using multiple external hard drives - and while I have USB-C to micro 3 USB to connect them directly, it needs multiple ports to do transfers between them. And my monitor is over a USB-C to displayPort adapter. And my Strike 3 headset is USB-A. So a mouse, keyboard, headphones and monitor is 4 ports already, add in two hard drives and a hub is basically a requirement.

Because of that, and reductions in port count as you note, I agree with you that I would expect hub use to increase over time. I certainly use them more with this laptop than my previous one, and my next one will probably be similar.