A lot of people are moving to wireless charging, but one of the coolest gadgets for your desk in 2024 is a hub full of powerful USB ports. The Anker Prime Charger 250W is ultra-convenient with six ports, but its power extends beyond that thanks to its smart display.

Anker Prime Charger 250W

8/ 10

$119 $170 Save $51

Experience the convenience of high-capacity charging with this 250W desktop charger, featuring four USB-C and two USB-A ports to power up your essentials simultaneously.

Pros

• Six USB ports
• High total power output
• Clock is generally useful
• Lots of control over power/ports

Cons

• Can be messy with front ports
• Pricey solution

$169.99 at anker$119 at Amazon

Price and Availability

The Prime Charger 250W is available for purchase now. It retails for $169.99 but has been on sale multiple times since its release. The charger plugs into an AC outlet for power and measures 4.18 x 1.58 x 3.64 inches.

The Main Point Is Its Power

The Anker Prime Charger 250W has a lot of neat features, but its primary purpose is to deliver a lot of power and charge your devices fast. As evident by its name, it can handle up to a total of 250 watts.

Individually, a single USB-C port will top out at 140W. When you do add in more devices, you can decide whether to let the charger intelligently split up the power or you can manually adjust the power limits. With all six ports in use, you can get 100W from a USB-C one and 45W from the other three, with the remaining 15W split between the two USB-A ports on the side.

What’s the need for all this power and this type of device? I keep finding my desk inundated with new gadgets that live there, like an Apple Vision Pro, Fujifilm X100VI, and iPad Pro M4, to name a few. Before the Prime Charger 250W, I was constantly struggling to find multiple chargers and AC outlets for them all. There are a ton of good power adapters out there, but don’t have enough ports or the total power to handle more than a couple of devices at once.

I’ve found that the Prime Charger 250W’s four USB-C ports cover all my rotating power needs. The USB-A ports are just a bonus that I can use for legacy devices.

The Extra Features Make This Charger Super Handy

Even if you can find a device that offers multiple fast-charging ports, fewer of them have a customizable display. The immediate benefit is being able to see how much power each plugged-in device is using in real-time.

I do need to see this data occasionally to write about tech products, but even when I don’t, I still find it useful. With a check of the screen, I can tell whether the USB-C is working correctly and about how long I can expect charging to take.

Even if you don’t need to see any of those charging speed numbers, you might just find it interesting. That’s worthwhile too. But if you would rather see something else, the display can show a clock in various styles. I would like to see the 2.26-inch screen size expanded on the next version. But for now, it’s fine.

The twist knob on the right side of the charger makes for a pleasant control mechanism. It scrolls through the settings and selects them with a push. The whole metal-enclosed unit is sturdy and well-built.

You can alter a lot of the settings directly on the Prime Charger 250W. Things like screen brightness, time-out duration, charging mode, and even the knob twisting direction. But even better is the ability to connect the charger to Anker’s mobile app, available for iPhone and Android.

The benefit of this is being able to see a graph of the power output ports. The main thing is that you can assign a power schedule for each port. So I can have the first USB-C port start powering a device from 7:00AM to 10:00AM and then turn it off for the rest of the day. You can also change all the same settings as on the device in the app.

At one point, I thought I had encountered a bug in which the charger’s screen would go dark after being on too long. It turned out to be just a setting in the app that allows you to turn the screen off so it doesn’t disturb people overnight.

This charger’s biggest downside is its four USB-C ports are on the front. That looks nice in marketing photos, but in use, that means a lot of cables sitting right in front of it. If you position it front and center to see the clock, then the cables will run right across the middle of your desk. I’m not sure what the solution to this problem is, but it’s a quirk to be aware of. The charger will make powering devices convenient, but it probably won’t help with organization.

Should You Buy the Anker Prime Charger 250W?

The main consideration for the Anker Prime Charger 250W is its price. Its $170 price isn’t unreasonable for a charging hub, but it is still steep. Even though it largely falls in line with what you might pay for other solutions, it might just be a splurge over other charging solutions.

But if you are in the market for a compact charging hub bursting with features, I think the Prime Charger 250W is the one to get. Its display might even solve problems of being able to control charging speeds later, down the line. The good news is that Anker products will go on sale at some point and will make this charger a better value.

Anker Prime Charger 250W

8/ 10

$119 $170 Save $51

Experience the convenience of high-capacity charging with this 250W desktop charger, featuring four USB-C and two USB-A ports to power up your essentials simultaneously.

$169.99 at anker$119 at Amazon