Jackery Explorer 100D makes an eight-year promise I want to see kept
Jackery’s latest power station is also its smallest. The Explorer 100D is a palm-sized brick for people who work out of departure gates and coffee shops, and it goes on sale at Costco before showing up at Walmart in the middle of the month.
Size is the headline Jackery wants you to notice. I keep looking past it at the battery inside. You might end up keeping this one longer than the phone you charge with it.
Built to outlast your phone
Jackery rates the 100D’s LiFePO4 cells for 3,000 full cycles. Drain it and refill it every day and, by the company’s math, you get eight years. Buy one this Christmas and on paper it’s still going in 2034.
Ordinary lithium-ion power banks give out somewhere between 300 and 500 cycles, and by Jackery’s own reckoning that leaves you shopping for a replacement after a year or a year and a half of daily top-ups, around the time your phone case starts looking scruffy and well before you’d think about upgrading the phone itself. I won’t trust the eight-year figure until owners put a few winters on these units. Even so, a sixfold head start leaves plenty of room to fall short and still win.
$99 at Walmart, cheaper at Costco
Costco gets it first. Select warehouses stock a two-pack for $179.99 from November 7, and the single unit hits Walmart for $99 on November 15. Split that bundle with your partner and you’re paying about $90 apiece. I’d make the Costco run.
A cube with two laptop ports
Don’t expect it to vanish into a jacket. At 4.7 by 3.3 by 3.4 inches and 1.9 pounds, the 100D is shaped like a coffee mug with a handle on top, and it wants the main compartment of your bag. Jackery says the 96 Wh capacity is cleared for domestic and international flights.
Two USB-C ports each push up to 140 W, with an 18 W USB-A port alongside. Total output stops at 158 W. Hook up two laptops at once and they’ll split it. My favorite number in the whole announcement is the claim that a 14-inch MacBook Pro gets more than a full charge from one 100D, because that’s the job a carry-on battery exists to do.
Charging it back up
With a 100 W USB-C charger, expect an 80% charge in around 90 minutes. Solar charging has the same 100 W input rating, and the panel plugs straight into the unit.
Vehicle charging varies more, taking just over three hours on 12 V and less than two on 24 V.
Where the Explorer 100 Plus fits
Compared with the Explorer 100 Plus, the 100D weighs less, takes up less room, and has a 50% longer rated lifespan. Those are Jackery’s claims. I still want to know how much capacity the battery retains after years of everyday use.
