Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount With MagSafe Review: Clean Look, Solid Performance

The mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount with MagSafe is one of the best iPhone-friendly vent mounts you can purchase for your car, truck, or RV.

An iPhone charging on the mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount with MagSafe.
Jason Montoya / How-To Geek

The Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount With MagSafe is an excellent iPhone accessory for any car. Not only does it provide full access to your iPhone’s screen, buttons, and ports, but the charger can push up to 15 watts to your iOS device. I also guarantee your phone won’t fall off this thing.

 

Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount With MagSafe

Keep your MagSafe-compatible iPhone full charged and within sight while driving with the Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount With MagSafe.

Brand
Zagg
Output
15W (with MagSafe-compatible iPhone)
Input
20W USB-C car adapter included
Cable included
1.5 m (60-in.) USB-C cable
Weight
4oz (113 g)
Dimension
Height: 3.3in (8.3cm), Length: 1.5in (3.7cm), Width: 2.4in (6 cm)

Pros

  • Great charging capabilities
  • User-friendly design
  • Works with multiple iPhone models and other MagSafe devices
  • Comes with everything you need to plug and play

Cons

  • A little expensive
  • May not work optimally with Android devices
  • Metallic vent-grip hook can be tough to work with

Design: Easy Access to Your Ports, Buttons, and Screen

The included parts of the mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount with MagSafe.
Jason Montoya / How-To Geek
  • Dimensions: 3.3 x 2.4 x 1.5in (83.82 x 60.96 x 38.1mm)
  • Weight: 0.25lbs (0.113kg)
  • Connection: USB-C to 12V DC

The Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount with MagSafe (herein referred to as the Mophie MagSafe) looks about the same as most MagSafe-friendly car mounts. A circular white disc houses the magnetic contacts for your iPhone, while the bottom part of this assembly features a recessed USB-C port. You’ll plug one end of the provided USB-C cable into this input while the other end plugs into the 12V DC adapter you’ll connect to your vehicle’s 12V DC port.

As for the vent-grip portion of the assembly, I’m actually not a big fan of the metallic hook that locks onto the vent. When attempting to hang it over my vent housing, I had some trouble getting things to lock into place and noticed that the hook was actually scratching up the car vent. I’ve seen plenty of vent mounts that work with just a hard plastic hook, so I wish Mophie would have gone in this direction instead.

The USB-C cable and 12V DC adapter for the mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount with MagSafe.
Jason Montoya / How-To Geek

In the box, you’ll also find an optional rotatable arm that can be placed between the mounting plate and vent grip to add some height to your iPhone’s mounting position. This part of the assembly, as well as many others, is covered in hard plastic, while the mounting plate feels more like silicone.

You can mount your iPhone in both portrait and landscape positions, although I recommend opting for portrait to take full advantage of the fact that all your ports and buttons will be available for pressing, toggling, and connecting. And seeing as we’re talking about a MagSafe mount, your iPhone should have no trouble hanging on the mount with a MagSafe case attached (just make sure the case is Qi-compatible or wireless charging won’t work).

Setup: The Quick Start Guide Is Your Friend

The mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount with MagSafe set up in a car.
Jason Montoya / How-To Geek

Generally speaking, I’m not a big fan of cracking open an instruction manual, but I actually recommend taking a good look at the quick start guide that comes with the Mophie MagSafe. To look at all the pieces separately, it’s not impossible to wrap your head around the assembly process, but the guide’s numbered steps offer a nice walkthrough. That being said, I’ll also be walking you through the process right now.

Out of the box, the first thing you’re going to want to do is fasten the mounting plate to the vent-grip piece. If you need a little extra height for the phone mount, Mophie provides a rotatable arm that can be fastened between the mounting plate and vent-grip (which is especially convenient for vehicles with LCD displays located below the vents). When you connect one piece to the next, you’ll want to make sure you place the threaded fastener over the rounded attachment point before snapping it in place, then tighten the fastener. Next, you’ll need to attach the vent-grip to whatever vent you’ll be using. The provided USB-C cable is just about five feet long, which gives you plenty of slack for a centralized vent.

The metal hook that sticks out of the vent-grip can expand and retract, which you can adjust by rotating the back-end of the vent-grip assembly to the left or right. Depending on how shallow or deep your car’s vent-partitioning is will ultimately determine how much hook there needs to be. When hanging the hook on your vent, I recommend attaching it to the middle of the housing, as going too high or low may put too much strain on the vent, which could prevent it from opening properly. With the hook in place, go ahead and tighten the back-end of the vent-grip until the hook locks the vent open and is ultra-snug. This part can get rather touchy, as both the hook and the car vent are going to move around a little bit while you’re tightening things down, but just have a little patience.

Now all that’s left to do is to plug the provided USB-C cable into the bottom of the mounting plate, connect the other end to the provided 12V DC adapter, and plug that into your vehicle’s 12V DC port. Conveniently, Mophie also provides a little cable-management clip for tidying up whatever USB-C slack is left over.

Functionality and Charging: Steady and Strong

An iPhone mounted to the mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount with MagSafe.
Jason Montoya / How-To Geek

I took the Mophie MagSafe for multiple drives to test its durability and charging capabilities. As far as the former goes, this is a pretty rock-solid vent mount. During the bumpy car drive up Route 9 toward Poughkeepsie, the interstate is home to many a pot hole and sudden bump. Whenever I would drive over one of these obstacles, my iPhone 12 remained safely in place on the Mophie MagSafe, with just a touch of vibration affecting my view of the screen. There were a couple of times that I checked the vent-grip connection to ensure everything was as solid as I thought, but doing so actually loosened the metallic hook from the vent, forcing me to re-tighten the assembly. I do think this loosening had more to do with me fiddling with the mount than the connection itself, though.

As far as charging goes, the Mophie MagSafe comes with a 20-watt USB-C cable that will push up to 15 watts of power to the MagSafe mounting plate, which is right around the maximum for wireless charging on iPhones these days. I tested the mount with an iPhone 12 and thought the Mophie did an awesome job recharging the device. In one test, at 6:25, my iPhone battery was at 52% capacity. After placing it on the Mophie MagSafe for a little over half an hour, my battery was up 94%. That’s about one-tenth of the battery recharged for every 10 minutes of driving, which isn’t bad at all in my book. But what about other devices? In terms of compatibility, the Mophie MagSafe is designed to work with all iPhone 14, 13, and 12 models. I also tested the mounting plate with my AirPods Pro 2 case. At 7:10, my case was at 62% charge capacity, and at 7:20, the charge level went up to 70%. Bearing these results in mind, you could completely recharge a dead AirPods Pro case in a little over an hour with the Mophie MagSafe.

As far as Android devices go, Mophie will usually indicate whether or not one of their products is designed for universal use or only for iOS devices. In the case of the Mophie MagSafe, the company is leaning heavy on its “Apple exclusive” branding, but with the Galaxy S23 and S23 phone cases now incorporating MagSafe, chances are pretty good you’ll be able to charge certain Android phones with the Mophie MagSafe, too. That said, where charging tops out at 15 watts for iPhones, Android hardware may only receive up to 10 watts or less.

Should You Buy the Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount With MagSafe?

For just under $100, the Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount with MagSafe may be a little pricier than the typical $30 third-party car mount, but what you’re really paying for is the powerful MagSafe mounting pad and wireless charging capabilities. Both of these features work extremely well, and if you’re in the market for an iPhone vent mount you’ll never have to replace, the Mophie MagSafe would be at the top of my list.

Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount With MagSafe

Keep your MagSafe-compatible iPhone full charged and within sight while driving with the Mophie Wireless Charging Vent Mount With MagSafe.