To understand how a solar panel phone charger works, you really just need to know what a solar panel and a power bank are. The former, of course, is a technology that allows us to harness the power of the sun and convert it into consumable energy.
There are different types of solar panels, but they all follow the same principle: The sun strikes a solar panel, which converts the light absorbed by its cells into energy. The energy may then be directed to charge an internal battery.
When you’re shopping for any power bank charger for your phone, you’ll see the number rated as “mAh,” or milliampere-hour. This is the measurement of how much energy a battery can store. A higher mAh essentially means you’ll be carrying more power to charge your devices. For example, the average smartphone battery comes in around 5,000 mAh. In optimal conditions, a solar panel phone charger rated at 5,000 mAh should be able to fully charge most phones.
You typically want your power bank to have a higher mAh than the device you’re charging, though small mAh batteries tend to be physically smaller, and easier to carry around, too.
