Apple faces development hurdles with MagSafe battery pack accessory

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  This is the current MagSafe charger, which is sold separately from the iPhone 12. [credit: Samuel Axon ]

Bloomberg has published yet another report sharing details of a planned Apple product launch. This time, the publication's sources say Apple is working on a magnetically attached battery pack for iPhones—it would be the first Apple-designed iPhone battery pack that does not double as a case.

The accessory would use the MagSafe feature introduced with the iPhone 12 lineup in October. It would magnetically attach to the back of new iPhones and presumably provide power wirelessly via the Qi standard that iPhones have adopted. According to Bloomberg's sources, the first prototypes have a "white rubber exterior."

Apple has also already shipped some MagSafe accessories for the iPhone, including a charging cable that uses the magnets and other components to optimally align the charging coils and produce faster charging speeds than were possible with previous iPhone models with non-MagSafe Qi charging capability.

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