Nomad’s Pod Pro ($80) is one of a few portable Apple Watch batteries we’ve seen so far, in addition to Zagg’s Mobile Charging Station and Kanex’s GoPower Watch. Pod Pro is a 6000 mAh battery which sets itself apart with a built-in Lightning cable for charging an iPhone. An Apple Watch charging cable is not included — you wrap the cable around a cord management core and it’s secured in the top of the body for charging. Pod Pro claims to offer eight full Apple Watch charges — enough for a week — or two full iPhone 6s charges.
Pod Pro uses an aluminum shell over a plastic body with a soft rubber base. While larger than Kanex’s GoPower Watch, it’s still relatively compact and easy to take with you, at roughly 4” in diameter, and about 1.25” tall. It also weighs less than half a pound. An Apple Watch charging cable is plugged into the battery under the shell, and looped around the top so the charger can be placed up top.
The short Lightning cable tucks away nicely along the side of the battery, next to the micro-USB charging port, and a battery power button with LED status lights. It’s a handsome, clean design, though it doesn’t offer Nightstand mode, and we do wish the shell would screw on — as is, it can fall off the top when you’re carrying Pod Pro around. It’s also somewhat notable that Pod Pro has output speeds of 1A for Lightning and .5A for Apple Watch, so iOS charging may not be quite as fast it could be.
The fact of the matter is, we really like all the Apple Watch portable batteries we’ve seen so far, for slightly different reasons, and they all offer easy charging solutions for $100 or less. But the elegant $80 Pod Pro, with its built-in Lightning cable and large capacity battery, might be our favorite.
