Solar Chargers are hot in the market. As current solar charger does not have industry standards, the price and quality is so different from each other. I have found some solar chargers for less than us$5 dollar one piece in the market. So what kind of solar chargers are good?

Evaluation of a solar charger mainly depends on three aspects:

First one is solar panels:

Currently there are two type of solar panel one is amorphous silicon solar cells and the other is crystal silicon solar cell. Crystal Silicon can be divided into polycrystalline and mono crystalline. The photovoltaic conversion efficiency for each kind is: mono crystalline (up to 17 per cent)> polycrystalline (12 to 15 per cent)> amorphous silicon (5 percent). However, crystalline in poor light does not have a current. Therefore, it is better to use mono crystalline or polycrystalline for the solar cell material.

Next we need to focus on the solar panel power. Generally speaking, the solar panels power is proportional to the size of the chip. Solar panels power is the more the better, so that the current under the sun, will be filled with its built-in battery soon. But in reality, we need to find a balance point between the solar panel power and the size of solar charger. Generally speaking, solar power charger can not be less than 0.75 w, if it is less than this, charge current will be too small, basically there will be no obvious effect.

The second one is Control circuit:

The solar panel is in the front of the charger, being responsible for collecting solar energy and transferring solar energy into electricity. The control circuit is the hub of the entire product. It has two features: Firstly, the current will be saved as much as possible and be transferred to the built-in battery, the other is when the charger recharge cell phones and other devices, the electricity in the battery should be transferred to them as much as possible. Unfortunately, because of technical problems, some china manufacturers don't pay too much attention on the designing of the central circuit, resulting in producing poor quality solar charger.

When consumers decide to buy solar charger, they need to pay more attention to these two indicators: Second conversion rate (the front end to the storage battery) and discharge efficiency .Solar chargers with high efficiency is better.

The third one is Battery:

As the use of solar charger is different from other general electronics, the built-in solar battery should have the highest requirements. However, it is easy to be overlooked by consumers. In the market, the same capacity battery prices may vary pretty much, some manufacturers make very cheap chargers by using grade B batteries. It will not only make battery die earlier but also threaten to consumer’s safety.

Finally we should pay attention to shell surface and its annexes.
If the solar chargers come with a DC adapter, we should also pay attention to the quality of DC adapter.

Good luck with your solar charger shopping!