The combo charger and headphone jack adapter you want for your just ordered iPhone 7 is coming from Belkin instead of Apple. The accessory maker is showing off the Lightning Audio + Charge RockStar adapter on its website—and even though it isn’t shipping yet, it’ll still probably arrive before your Jet Black iPhone 7.
Belkin’s new adapter is a Lightning port splitter, meaning it turns your iPhone’s single Lightning port into two. You can use one port to charge your iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus, and the other for your Lightning connector headphones—or Apple’s own Lightning to 3.5mm headphone jack adapter.
Apple’s critics were pretty vocal with their disappointment in the company for removing the 3.5mm headphone jack from the iPhone 7—a decision Apple made in part to free up more space for other internal components.
With the traditional headphone jack gone, Apple expects iPhone 7 owners to use headphones sporting a Lightning connector—like the EarPods included in the box, Bluetooth earphones, or their current wired headphones with the Lightning to 3.5mm adapter that’s also included. The problem is that unless you’re using Bluetooth headphones, listening to music and charging is an either/or proposition.
Belkin’s new adapter solves that problem by turning your iPhone’s single Lightning port into two. Doubling the ports means you can charge while using old school connector or Lightning connector headphones. Sure, it’s another dongle hanging off the bottom of your iPhone, but the trade off is that you can juice up your battery and listen to music or answer calls hands-free at the same time.
The Lightning Audio + Charge RockStar adapter costs US$39.99 and will ship soon.
I suspect Apple’s thinking is, “Buy our wireless EarPods” then charging while listening is not an issue.
But then, I have been hankering for a wireless solution for my EarPods 🙂
It’s worth repeating something posted elsewhere:
You can not use this to charge your phone twice as fast.