[Feature Request] Tesla Should Add the Ability to Turn Wireless Charging Off in Settings

[Ostrichsak]

I love the idea of wireless charging for when I need it. This will likely make up about 2% or so of our use though. What I don't need is my phone to go through a dozen charge cycles on a quick 15min drive in to work, more on longer trips. For us, we normally have plenty of charge left at the end of a typical day w/o charging at all so there would be no benefit from this "feature" most days. The downside is that dozen(s) of unnecessary charge cycles every day will shorten the lifespan of the phone battery.

I do love the designated storage spot for the phones though so I'd love to use them regularly. A simple way to disable wireless charging in the menu would be ideal. For those who utilize their wireless charging every day there would be no change to functionality. For those (like us) who prefer to disable it and then enable it when we're on longer road trips it would be easy.

Not sure how Tesla has tied that wiring into the harness/MCU. If it's tied into the power wires for anything else that may make a software change difficult. If it's connected to USB ports or something to get power (likely) then that makes this much more challenging from a purely software standpoint. If it's physically wired separately this should be able to be a simple software update to add functionality.

I realize I can disable this on the phone but we use wireless charging at night on our bedside stands so it would be annoying to have to disable and enable it every time we got in the car. I could also envision a time where we forgot to enable it again and then it wouldn't charge on the stand which may result in a nearly dead phone the next morning or having it die in the middle of the night so the alarm doesn't go off the next morning in a worst case scenario.

Does anyone use some sort of a physical plate to block the wireless charge? This would be the simplest of band-aid fixes and something with a black alcantara layer on it to match what's already there would be ideal.

Admin note: Image added for Blog Feed thumbnail

 

[zoomer0056]

But the number of cycles you get out of the battery doubles when you lower the charge limit by 10%. Number of cycles also increases with decreased average depth of discharge. Phone batteries often die quickly because people don't know better and keep charging them to 100% even when they don't need to.

I've never ever worried about that for my phones. Always charge to 100% at night after a full days use. I get a new phone about every four years.

 

[kelpcar]

Funny you should mention Nokia, in a previous life I was a certified Nokia repair technician so much of my applied knowledge of smart phones comes from those days. That said, charge cycle are charge cycles. Even though new chemistry is better at that, needless charge cycles still don't help with the overall lifespan on a rechargeable battery. This goes the same across all rechargeable battery types, styles and manufacturers.

This is not correct. Charge cycles are not charge cycles, independent of how much juice is applied. With EVs, where the manufacturers have great incentive not to give bad advice, the messaging is generally ABC (always be charging), within a belt of 20-80%.

But the obvious solution to this fear is just a barrier on one or both sides of the charging pad. No need for a software switch or a physical alternation to the car.

 

[STS-134]

This is not correct. Charge cycles are not charge cycles, independent of how much juice is applied. With EVs, where the manufacturers have great incentive not to give bad advice, the messaging is generally ABC (always be charging), within a belt of 20-80%.

But the obvious solution to this fear is just a barrier on one or both sides of the charging pad. No need for a software switch or a physical alternation to the car.

The obvious solution is a charge limit setting on the phone itself that stops charging at say 50% SoC. Just like we have on our cars.

 

[Sideman7]

I'm pretty sure this was an option that has been mentioned before, so some day we may actually get it...

Mentioned here a year ago... Tesla to add option to turn off your wireless charger

In the mean time, I just unplugged mine. I like the location for the phone, but don't want it to charge most of the time.

 

[Ostrichsak]

This is not correct. Charge cycles are not charge cycles, independent of how much juice is applied. With EVs, where the manufacturers have great incentive not to give bad advice, the messaging is generally ABC (always be charging), within a belt of 20-80%.

But the obvious solution to this fear is just a barrier on one or both sides of the charging pad. No need for a software switch or a physical alternation to the car.

Your statement assumes that the batteries in EVs is the same thing as those in smart phones, only smaller. They are not. They battery chemistry that makes them up is engineered for different things. Imaging if your EV needed a new battery after only a year or two.

 

[777Path]

I also wish there was a setting to turn off the Qi phone charger pads. Great spot for phones to go but I don't want my phone to always be at 100% or cook on high heat.

 

[STS-134]

Your statement assumes that the batteries in EVs is the same thing as those in smart phones, only smaller. They are not. They battery chemistry that makes them up is engineered for different things. Imaging if your EV needed a new battery after only a year or two.

Battery chemistry is largely the same. EVs just don't go through as many cycles per day and don't charge to 4.20V/cell all the time. Teslas are some of the rare vehicles that actually let you charge all the way to 4.20V/cell and they warn you not to do it regularly. Most other brands just don't even allow it, and define 100% as some lower voltage.

 

[kelpcar]

Your statement assumes that the batteries in EVs is the same thing as those in smart phones, only smaller. They are not. They battery chemistry that makes them up is engineered for different things. Imaging if your EV needed a new battery after only a year or two.

my cell phones last 3-4 years. If you fully used your EV battery daily, you'd be driving 80-90k miles per year, and 4 years would be longer than most cars' lifespan.
back to the point - 10 5% charges is less than a single full cycle. They are not the same.

 

[NovaY]

This worry is largely irrational. Lithium-ion battery life is actually significantly extended if the user uses the middle range of its capacity. There isn't a fixed number of charge/discharge cycles, but rather a rough total life calculated by the number of 0-100-0% cycles and the overall capacity of the battery. Say you have a 10Wh cell phone battery rated for 200 cycles, then you have roughly a floor of 2000Wh of charge/discharge cycles, whether you do this in full 10Wh cycles, or 5Wh 50% cycles, or 1Wh 10% cycles, the number of cycles does not reduce the life of the battery. You can, therefore, cycle the battery 2000 times at 1Wh and be no worse off than cycling it 200 times at 10Wh.

However, since lithium-ion batteries degrade the most at the extreme ranges of their capacity, whether it's the top 20% or the bottom 20%, short cycling within the middle range can significantly prolong the battery life. There is an argument that you shouldn't keep topping off the battery if it is already above 80%.

 

[sidewinder]

i still think there is some misunderstanding as to what a "charge cycle" is. a typical li-ion cell has life of around 500 charge cycles. since each cycle is defined as charging from 0 - 100 (or discharging), that means it can be charged from 0-100 around 500 times before being considered end of life.

thing that trips some people up is that they think plugging/unplugging the charging cable or on/off the wireless charger is considered a charge cycle. the fact is a cycle can be divided up any number of ways and it will not impact battery health. so, charging 20 times a day at 5% each time would only use 1 cycle of 500 total cycles.

here's what apple says about it:

Batteries - Why Lithium-ion?

Learn why Apple rechargeable lithium-based technology provides the best performance for your iPhone, iPad, iPod, and MacBook.

www.apple.com

at the end of the day, there are better things to do than worry about a phone battery life. battery replacements are fairly cheap if its ever needed.

 

[woolymammoth17]

Just today on a 4 hour trip I was wishing the same. Tesla should allow us to turn the wireless charging pad off. Has almost no value even if you need a charge. Most wireless phone "chargers" in vehicles can be more accurately described as wireless phone heaters. Very little of the energy is making it into the phones battery, but a lot of it is being passed as heat due to inefficiencies. Cooking the battery is not great for it.

 

[Midnightsun]

You do know a charge cycle is from 0 to 100% right? Charging several times a day does not equate to a charge cycle unless you have used the equivalent of 100% battery during that time. I have a 13 pro max about 1 1/2 years old. Gets put on my magsafe charger every day when I return home and remains there until morning. It is on the Tesla charge pad all the time when I am in the car. Just checked battery health and it's at 96%. Read this.

Edit. OOPS did not see the post just above stating basically the same thing.

 

[MorrisonHiker]

But the number of cycles you get out of the battery doubles when you lower the charge limit by 10%. Number of cycles also increases with decreased average depth of discharge. Phone batteries often die quickly because people don't know better and keep charging them to 100% even when they don't need to.

The obvious solution is a charge limit setting on the phone itself that stops charging at say 50% SoC. Just like we have on our cars.

My phone lets me limit charging to 85% to protect battery life. Does your phone not have a similar option?

 

[STS-134]

My phone lets me limit charging to 85% to protect battery life. Does your phone not have a similar option?

It does not, but I manually limit it to roughly 50% most of the time.

 

[Darmie]

Since it's only used 2% of the time, just unplug the charger. Problem solved.

 

[777Path]

Since it's only used 2% of the time, just unplug the charger. Problem solved.
View attachment 907125

Don't think it's that easy on the newer Y or 3- my 2023 Y has the USB ports in a different location and no apparent way to get in behind the phone charger pads.

 

[Spinkick]

I dont know if the added complexity is really worth it. I dont think you are going through more charging cycles, just because you are charging your phone when its capacity is high already. Just disable wireless charging in the phone.

In Android phones, you could even make it a bixby routine or google to do item so that any time the phone connects to the car's bluetooth, wireless charging is disabled.

TLDR; disable wireless charging on your phone

 

[arbitrage000]

Another trick that works well is to lay the phone in landscape mode along both charger slots. Stays in place due to bottom lip of the charger and doesn't charge. Of course only works if you aren't wanting 2 phones to sit there.

 

[RobotX]

Simply flip your phone upside down (where the back camera is pointing outwards).
This effectively increases the gap between your phone and the wireless charging and making a handshake with the charger ineffective.
There's a disadvantage of not seeing notification, but usually the phone is connected to the car anyway, phone calls and messages are easily accessible from the screen.

 

[Z_Lynx]

I use the free version of accubattery's android app to monitor my phone battery, which has definitely lost some capacity.

https://accubattery.zendesk.com/hc/en-us

Reviews note it is pretty popular:

AccuBattery Review: Android Battery Health Monitor | TechaLook

Used to plug phone in at night and unplug it in the morning. After learning how to improve the health of my MY's battery, I incorporated some of that knowledge into managing my phone's battery.

Now seldom charge fully, do not leave "unused" at full charge (what one should avoid with Tesla's big battery). A new phone service has been draining my battery at night so for the last few months I just put it in airplane mode (a nearby voip phone is available to receive calls).

Phone shows what apps and services are using the battery and produces a nice 24 hour graph.

p.s. I pulled out the Tesla pad charger (phone needs to be plugged in anyway) after I noticed the phone getting too warm if anywhere near the charge pad. Heat is bad. I also trickle charge the phone when I'm at my computer (old Thinkpad).