How to Charge a Solar Power Bank

Ever felt the pangs of anxiety when your phone runs out of juice? Guess what? Feeling heightened anxiety as you move farther away from your power socket is normal. Perhaps, it’s also why packing an additional power bank is more vital than an extra juice pack when traveling or camping outdoors.

Solar power banks are a great way to charge your devices when outdoors. These solar tools have become an indispensable essential to lengthen the life of your device(s). They are portable, lightweight, and compact too. The best part is that they can charge anything from your car batteries to laptops and even mobile phones.

Now, your solar power bank can charge multiple devices, but how do you charge the solar power bank?

To charge your solar power bank, you need direct sunlight, and it usually takes somewhere between 30-50 hours to be fully charged. However, depending on battery size and other variables, this number can go up or down.

Interested to know more? Continue reading this detailed guide and learn how to efficiently charge a solar power bank!

How Does Solar Power Bank Work?

Solar power banks come with in-built, rechargeable lithium-based batteries. These banks have solar panels attached to them, made of photovoltaic cells. When the sunlight hits the panels, the photovoltaic cells collect the photons and store them in the conductive plate.

The conducive plate uses these photons to create electricity and feed them to the rechargeable batteries. The batteries hold on to this electricity and keep them stored until needed.

Solar energy, without a doubt, is the most abundant and green source of energy on the earth. Did you know that the sun is over 4.5 billion years old? Yes, that’s a lot, but you need not worry because it still has about 5 million years to go. So, if you’re thinking of investing in solar tools like solar power banks and solar chargers, you are on the right track to a more sustainable life.

Besides, you can also charge your solar power bank using a power socket. It’s a myth that solar devices require heat to charge, but they do not. Solar tools and devices depend on light rather than the sun’s heat to charge.

This is also why it’s always mentioned in the instructions manual to place the solar device in a location with ample direct sunlight.

When Can You Charge a Solar Power Bank?

Now that you know that it’s the photons that charge your solar power bank and not the heat, you can charge your solar bank anywhere. However, the location should have unobstructed sunlight exposure for optimum charging.

That being said, it’s no use to charge your power bank in a location that lacks sunlight, even if it’s the hottest hour of the day. Instead, try charging your solar devices before noon. Solar devices tend to collect more energy when the light energy is highest, before noon when the sun is at its peak in the sky.

Can You Charge Solar Power Bank In Indirect Sunlight?

Yes, you can charge your power bank in indirect sunlight, but it won’t be as efficient as direct sunlight solar charging.

When indirect sunlight hits the panel, the amount of energy accumulated by the solar cells is also less. This results in less electricity generation, putting you in an energy crunch when you need to charge your devices while camping in the great outdoors.

Moreover, if the solar panel of your solar charger is small, it will charge very slowly and inefficiently in indirect sunlight. For optimum power bank charging, you’ll need to add a few more panels to it to increase its charging capacity.

If additional panels are not an option, you can also try hanging the solar panels on your bag to increase its exposure to the sun.

Will Your Solar Power Bank Charge in Shade?

No, your solar power bank will not charge in the shade or on a cloudy day. To get better clarity on this subject, you first need to understand what ‘shade’ means here.

The ‘shade’ here denotes complete obstruction of sunlight, much like the shadow cast by opaque objects.

However, the same cannot be said about the shade of a tree because they don’t completely block the sunlight. You can still find sunlight piercing through it and forming small bits of light on the ground.

The sunlight blocked by a tree comes under reflected light, resulting in inefficient charging of your power bank. However, the shadow cast by an opaque body like a human is a shade, and you cannot charge your power bank in that shade at all.

Should You Charge Solar Power Banks in Direct Sunlight?

Yes, it would be best to charge your solar chargers in direct sunlight. The charging hours of solar banks depend on their battery capacity and size.

The battery capacity of a solar bank usually ranges between 15000 – 20000 mAh. Therefore, if your solar panel is compact, it can’t be fully charged via the sun’s energy alone.

Even manufacturers advise charging solar devices through USB ports after it has reached a 50% mark. This is also the case for even the best solar power banks in the market.

Any solar or electronic device tends to charge very fast until it replenishes half of its energy. However, after the 50% mark, these devices tend to charge slowly because they have already accumulated the minimum reserve of energy they need to function.

How Can You Speed Up the Charging of Solar Power Banks?

Are you getting late for your camping trip, but your cell phone battery happens to be dead? Don’t sweat; it’s for times like this that solar chargers and banks prove to be the best savior.

Even if your solar bank happens to have less charge and takes a long time to accumulate energy, here are a few tips you can use to speed up how long it takes to charge a solar power bank!

More Solar Panels Are Better

The more solar panels the bank will have, the more energy it will collect. Many solar panels mean a large surface for accumulating light particles.

Due to this, direct light hitting the solar panel also increases, resulting in faster and higher electricity generation. Hence, adding a few solar panels to your solar device can boost its charging and functioning capacity.

Avoid Shade

The importance of avoiding shade cannot be stressed enough. You can observe a tremendous change in the charging capacity of your solar devices by simply avoiding shade.

It also means that you may have to change the device’s position multiple times in a day, depending on the hour and position of the sun. You can also attach your solar bank to your backpack while traveling to give it extra sun exposure and avoid shade simultaneously.

How To Know When Your Solar Power Bank Has Fully Charged?

Solar power banks usually have a series of single LED lights that light up once the device has been fully charged. These LED lights help determine whether the power bank has any charge left after charging your cell phones and mobile devices.

Although this is the case for most solar power banks, some power banks also come with an app that tells you their charge level.

Summing Up

Solar power banks are essential if you’re an adventure enthusiast. You need to place the device in a location with ample sunlight for a few hours to recharge your mobile phone indefinitely.

They are environmentally friendly, wireless, waterproof, and even come with an LED flashlight. Furthermore, most power banks have multiple charging options such as USB charging, USB Port, and even battery bank.

So, bring home your very own solar power bank today and enjoy your outdoor trips stress-free!