When you start searching for a new charger, a term you’ll often see pop up in features and product names is GaN, Gallium nitride. Semiconductors made with gallium nitride can be smaller than silicon versions, and smaller, lighter chargers are almost always better. The tech is still pretty new, this is still a relatively small field, but these are the best GaN chargers with Power Delivery charging you can buy today.
Great size and price
RAVPower GaN PD 90W Wall Charger
Staff pick
This 90W charger is smaller than a lot of 60W chargers thanks to GaN semiconductors, and it’s absolutely perfect for charging a phone and laptop or even two laptops at once.
$55 at Amazon
Insanely small
AUKEY PA-Y19 30W USB-C Wall Charger
Roughly the size of a quarter, this is one of the most compact chargers on the market. Granted, 30W won’t charge a MacBook Pro quickly, but it’s great for iPads, Chromebooks, and phones.
$25 at Amazon
Charge it all at once
Anker PowerPort Atom III Slim 65W (Four Ports)
This desktop charging station is compact and actually kind of handsome with that texture across the top. You can charge a laptop plus three peripherals at once, like a phone, smartwatch, and headphones.
$54 at Amazon
Next-gen compact
AUKEY Omnia Duo 65W PD Charger
The Omnia Series is looking like the GaN chargers to beat in the upcoming year, and the 65W dual-port is a great option for charging a laptop and phone in a single compact charger.
$60 at Amazon
Best for Chromebooks
RAVPower PD Pioneer 45W GaN Wall Charger
This wide, slim charger is 45W — the top charging speed for just about every Chromebook around and a great speed for other laptops, too — and comes in black or white.
$33 at Amazon
Cool under pressure
Anker PowerPort Atom III 60W
Anker’s GaN charger is a little larger than some of the other 60W chargers on this list, but that extra size helps it not heat up quite as much as other compact GaN chargers do.
$40 at Amazon
Tiny yet mighty
RAVPower 61W PD GaN Wall Charger
This solid little brick is powerful enough to keep a MacBook Pro chugging along and small enough to fit comfortably in a purse or front jeans pocket. It makes an excellent replacement laptop charger.
$36 at Amazon
Sleek and stylish
Anker PowerPort Atom III Slim 30W
Like the 65W four-port model, this is another nice-looking GaN charger that can charge either a phone, tablet or laptop. It can also hide in a deck of playing cards if your coworkers tend to “borrow” yours.
$35 at Amazon
What GaN actually is and what it does in your charger
GaN stands for Gallium Nitride, an alternative to the traditional silicon that has dominated electronics for the last few decades. Gallium nitride has some advantages — a wider band-gap means it’s easier for energy to pass through it, and it has higher limits for the temperatures and power levels it can handle — that makes it almost tailor-made for higher-capacity tech like Power Delivery chargers.
In short, semiconductors and chargers made with gallium nitride are smaller and more efficient, which in turn can help them avoid heating up as much as traditional silicon-based chargers.
However, since the goal of most gallium nitride chargers is to be as small as possible, some GaN chargers still get uncomfortably warm when used for long periods of time because they don’t have as much room for heat dissipation. You’re not going to be able to bake a cookie on a GaN charger the way you can on a MacBook brick during an all-night editing session, but they’ll still get a little warm depending on how hard you work them.
One charger to rule them all
In an age where you can charge quite literally all of your tech via one protocol — from your laptop to your phone to all the power banks and headphones in between — one good Power Delivery charger can replace a dozen chargers. The RAVPower 90W charger is a great model for those that need to charge two devices at once, such as charging a laptop and a phone overnight in your hotel room.
If you need a pocket-friendly charger, I find myself torn. The Aukey PA-Y19 30W charger is what I keep in my pocket because the little building block is easy to keep in my pocket next to my hand sanitizer, but if you prefer slim and wide instead of small and chunky, the RAVPower 45W GaN Wall Charger is slim, reliable, and as easy to pack and pocket as a deck of playing cards.
