In summary:
- Macworld tested whether the MacBook Neo charges faster with higher-wattage adapters, finding modest improvements but significant limitations.
- A 96W adapter charged the device 30% in 30 minutes versus 15% with the included 20W adapter, but charging appears capped at 24 watts maximum.
- The MacBook Neo lacks official fast charging support and doesn’t meet Apple’s advertised fast-charging standards, making expensive charger upgrades questionable investments.
If you buy a MacBook Neo, you’ll get a 20W USB-C Power Adapter, the smallest charger Apple offers with any laptop. Apple sells higher-wattage adapters ranging from 35 watts up to 140 watts, and you can find third-party adapters with more features. The Neo’s charger is clunky and has just one port, so most people who buy one will likely use a different adapter that delivers more power.
However, the MacBook Neo doesn’t officially support fast charging like the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro. Apple never mentioned fast charging during its Apple Experience on March 4, and Apple’s support document about MacBook fast charging also doesn’t include the Neo.
Does a higher-watt charger make the MacBook Neo charge faster?
So it shouldn’t matter what kind of charger you use with the MacBook Neo. But we wanted to make sure there’s no difference if a higher-wattage adapter is used on the Neo. We tried charging a Neo’s battery at 20 percent to see how much it would gain in 30 minutes using Apple’s 96W USB-C Power Adapter and the bundled 20W USB-C Power Adapter.
As you can see from the results below, using a higher-wattage charger does make the MacBook Neo charge faster, but not as much as you might want.
Here are the results:
| Charger | Change after 30 minutes |
| 20W USB-C Power Adapter | +15% |
| 96W USB-C Power Adapter | +30% |
That’s… not the same. It also doesn’t fit Apple’s definition of fast charging, which is up to 50 percent battery in around 30 minutes. So we did some digging.
Below are screenshots of the Battery Health 2 app, which I used to take a look at the charging rates. The shot on the left is with the 96W charger; the right shot is with the 20W charger. In the section labeled “Charging With,” the 96W charger charges at twice the rate of the 20W charger, but still seemingly limited. While on The Full Nerd podcast, we plugged in a 250-watt charger, and the rate was similar to the 96W charger.
It turns out that the MacBook Neo has a max charging rate of 35 watts, though the fastest we could get was around 24 watts when using a charger faster than the bundled 20W charger.
MacBook Neo charging with a 96W charger (left) and a 20W charger (right).
Foundry
Should you buy a better charger?
Based on these results, you can get a faster charging speed if you use a higher-wattage charger. But you don’t get the “50 percent in 30 minutes” that Apple touts with the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro fast charging, which is probably why they don’t promote it as fast-charging capable.
If you already own a higher-watt USB-C charger, it’s worth using, but don’t buy a charger only for faster charging, since gains are limited.
To sum up:
- The MacBook Neo appears capped at around 24 watts charging, though it has a 35-watt max
- Higher-watt adapters help because they deliver the full available power
- The laptop does not reach true fast-charging levels
Author: Roman Loyola, Senior Editor, Macworld
Roman is a Macworld Senior Editor with over 30 years of experience covering the tech industry, focusing on the Mac and other products in the Apple ecosystem. He is also the host of the Macworld Podcast. His career started at MacUser, where he received Apple certification as a repair technician (when Apple did that kind of thing). He's also worked for MacAddict, MacLife, and TechTV.