What Does The 'IQ' On Some Anker Accessories Mean?

Anker makes all kinds of power banks, portable chargers, and accessories to help keep your devices powered up while you're on the move. Some of those gadgets and gizmos come with their own specific features that you won't find on other devices or from other brands. That includes PowerIQ,a fast-charging feature that automatically detects the power your device needs to charge it as quickly as possible. It's proprietary technology, which means it's specific to and owned by Anker, but it operates on a similar concept to other fast-charging features you might already know about, like USB Power Delivery (PD).

PowerIQ — which is abbreviated to PIQ and marked on your charging device as IQ — has been around since 2014, when PowerIQ 1.0 launched. Since then, Anker has launched several iterations with wider compatibility and higher wattages. Now, we're up to PIQ 5.0. You can find PIQ 5.0 in the company's GaN Chargers, which work using gallium nitride components to charge your devices more efficiently. PowerIQ works with dynamic power-enabled devices via features like Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 and later, Power Delivery 3.0, and earlier versions of PIQ. Older versions have different compatibility and cap out at much lower wattages. 

The "I" in PowerIQ stands for intelligence. According to Anker, that's because the charger "intelligently" recognizes your device. When it does this, it decides the exact voltage your device needs to charge as quickly as possible. However, Anker hasn't defined exactly what the "Q" in "IQ" means — although you could speculate that it comes from "IQ," as in intelligence quotient.

PowerIQ isn't the only charging feature you might find on your Anker gadgets. Some devices also offer features like the aforementioned Power Delivery, Qualcomm Quick Charge (QC), or Programmable Power Supply (PPS). Which features you can use depend on which charger or power bank you have, and when it was released. Each option has different compatibilities, setting them apart from each other and from PowerIQ alike. Most importantly, you can find these features on other chargers, while PowerIQ is Anker-specific.

As well as your specific charger's capabilities, exactly which of these features you can make use of depends on your device's built-in features too. Power Delivery is supported by a variety of devices that meet the USB-PD specification, like a lot of Google Pixel handsets and iPhones. It's a similar case with PPS, too, which is available on a range of Google Pixel phones, Samsung devices, and selected tablets and laptops. Meanwhile, Quick Charge is offered on a lot of Android devices, with Quick Charge 3.0 being usable with any Android device with a Snapdragon processor — but that means you won't find it on Apple devices.

Like other charging features, each PIQ generation has slightly different compatibility requirements. For example, PIQ 1.0 supports 5 volt/2.4 amp connections. Subsequent generations offered expanded compatibility. All PIQ versions support backward compatibility with PIQ 1.0; PIQ 3.0 also supports QC 3.0 and PD 3.0, and PIQ 4.0 supports Dynamic Power Distribution.