GTrusted

The Belkin Boost Up 15-Watt Qi Compatible Wireless Charging Pad & Charger supports the Qi Medium Power technology to be able to theoretically wirelessly charge Qi Medium Power phones up to 15W. The Samsung Galaxy S8 can take advantage of only 7.5W based wireless charging but can still be used with this charger.

To see how charging happens between the Belkin Boost Up 15-Watt Qi Compatible Wireless Charging Pad & Charger and the Samsung Galaxy S8, we first plugged in the Belkin's supplied 24W AC power adapter accessory to the Belkin charging pad to power it. Once the Samsung phone was placed directly on top of the Belkin charging pad, the LED showed green to indicate that charging has started.

It required almost 3 hours for the Belkin Boost Up 15-Watt Qi Compatible Wireless Charging Pad & Charger to completely charge the Samsung Galaxy S8. By comparison, when tested using the 15 watts based Samsung Adaptive Fast Charging Charger in this review, we observed that the phone would take just below 2 hours when the battery is fully depleted, confirming that the Samsung Galaxy S8 does not support 15W of Qi wireless charging.

During charging, we could see that the Samsung Galaxy S8 was also sensitive to where the phone was placed on the Belkin charging pad. The phone had to be set exactly in the center of the pad in order to cause the green charging LED to light up showing that charging is happening.  

Even if the phone was less than an inch away from the center, charging wouldn't start.

It's important that the center of the phone needs to be directly at the exact center of the Belkin Boost Up 15-Watt Qi Compatible Wireless Charging Pad & Charger. If only the top or bottom of the phone is at the center of the charger, the phone will not charge.

Unlike charging through a USB cable which is secured to the phone, it's a lot easier to accidentally knock the exact center of the Samsung Galaxy S8  from the center of the Belkin Boost Up 15-Watt Qi Compatible Wireless Charging Pad & Charger and stop the charging process. It is also a lot faster to charge with the USB based Samsung Adaptive Fast Charging (AFC) Charger. 

If you want to stick with Qi wireless charging, be aware that the Samsung Galaxy S8 is not able to take advantage of the 15W available from the Belkin Boost Up 15-Watt Qi Compatible Wireless Charging Pad & Charger. The Belkin Boost Up 15-Watt Qi Compatible Wireless Charging Pad & Charger is a lot more expensive than the 7.5W based Samsung Fast Charge Wireless Charging Stand W/ AFC Wall Charger, and only useful if you are expecting more phones to support the 15W Qi Medium Power standard in the future.