iPhone 13 Otterbox Case and wireless charging challenges
 

I’ve been having problems keeping it charging, I know it works as it goes from green and then yellow, but after about 30-45 seconds it will lose connection and flash yellow. I’ve got it to stay charging, but I can’t seem to do it consistently. I’m not sure if it’s me not finding the sweet spot (this is the only wireless charging I’ve done), or if it has anything to do with the camera sticking out a bit. Any tips to find the right spot?

I would like to take the wireless charger and toss it off a cliff. it takes up 50% of the center console and is hidden away which means i can't access the phone. Just a completely useless and poorly integrated device. When I had the console apart, I looked for ways to remove the charger but couldn't locate any. It seems almost baked in. but i bet i can take a nother crack at it one day. i didn't want to start tearing into it too much. but it's super annoying.

i miss my base model ES without a charger. MASSIVE storage space.

I tried to get my UL without the charger because of the storage space issue, although of course that was a non-starter. Even so, I'm hard pressed to see the seductive power of wireless charging generally. It's bound to be less efficient than charging with a wire. Beyond that, I almost never enter my car in a situation where I need to charge the phone before I get home anyway. I just don't understand that feature.

I have never once use the wireless charger in my car since I bought it. I think that feature was there to mainly check some perceived box of a luxury feature of sort.

Exactly how I feel about the invisibly faint ambient interior lighting.

Lexus/Toyota wireless charging pads don't work with IPhones with the Magsafe charging. That's all iPhones 12 onwards. The reason is the magnets interferes with the charging circuit and results in the protection mechanism turning on. This is true even for the latest NX.

My phone is naked and I don’t have any problems with the on-board wireless charger.

It’s confusing. I have an iPhone 8 Plus and the website linked below states the Lexus wireless charger is incompatible with that model phone. However, I have no problem charging it even with the case on.

https://www.air-charge.com/aircharge...eless-charging

Also the Apple website explicitly states that its MagSafe phones (iPhone 12 and up) are designed to work with Qi wireless chargers (e.g. the Lexus charger) in addition to MagSafe chargers.

I've tested it on various chargers on the current ES, NS, UX and RX models on my iPhone 13 Pro and they all exhibit the same issue. Starts flashing after a while and then turns off.

Occurs on the current Camry and RAV4 too, which uses the same charging pads.

That thing just keeps my phone hot and barely charges it.

Here are a couple of Q & A links that shed some light on the issue but no real solution. (Apparently the official Apple position is that the phones should charge on car wireless chargers but some folks maybe have the phone in a case which is too thick. That’s an unsatisfactory response.)

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253307015

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253241718

Standard practice in my experience for most wireless charging. Use a wire - it's not that inconvenient.

I have had the exact issue you are describing. If I remember, I had a similar issue in my 2019 350 but back to the current 22 MY. I've done some testing to try to find out what the issue was and here are the results. I've used an iPhone 11 pro max and 13 pro max. Both support wireless charging and the 13 is magsafe capable. That doesn't matter as the qi wireless charger doesn't have magsafe capability. The only time I didn't experience the lost charge connection is when cases were off. So I tried the 11 with and without the case and the 13 with and without the case. I even purchased a Magsafe case for the 13 thinking that the non Magsafe case might be limiting it from charging for some reason. Didn't matter. If you listen carefully you can hear some clicking and unclicking noise from the charger when a connection is established and broken. Not sure what that is as I have really not researched any of this. Honestly, I despised the previous wireless charger in my 2019 as it was not compatible with my case so if I ever wanted to attempt wireless charging, I had to remove the case and that's a pain. So I never used it. Now in the 2022 ES, the wireless charger has been adjusted in it's position and can accommodate more sizes at the expense of dominating the entire center console. (This is probably one of my biggest gripes of my car other than a lack of overall storage.) But it won't work with a case on for my iPhones. So what is the deal? Is it just not strong enough? This is a serious misstep aside from the space it takes up. I mean how many people don't use a case with their $1000+ smartphones? It's just not practical to remove the case just to wirelessly charge when a charging cable will suffice. To make matters worse, they removed USB ports in the armrest so even if you wanted to charge your phone in the console with a cord, you can't. If there was wireless carplay I might use the wireless charger more but that isn't even available except in the new NX but then again, that thing is loaded with cool tech. The RX has a better setup for the wireless charger but the ES just doesn't have the space.

Couldn't agree more!

Worst of all, it has been added on to virtually every NX I've seen for sale, so we're paying for technology that simply doesn't work very well, even in the best situation.

The whole wireless charging route is a pita and not worth the trouble. I was looking for an elegant way to mount the phone. proclipusa.com seems to have decent mount but they on pricey side with all the accessories. In ES there is no really elegant way to mount for big screen phone. My requirement is I need phone screen within view and reach so I can use it as a second screen. At the end of the day I use this cheap mount:


Sure I lose a cup holder but over 99% of the time I don't need it. After a while I got use to this setup and came to really like it as view of iPhone is within easy view and reach while I am operating the vehicle. Best yet it keeps my phone charged without any issues. I like my meaty case and refuse to take it off every time to charge so wired charging is the way to go for me. I have use this setup almost 2 years now and love it.