It’s an inductive puck thing that the watch aligns itself to with magnets, honestly a lot nicer than needing to plug and unplug a cable. Feels like it will last longer, and it’s much more reliable than Pebble’s spring loaded charging pins were.

Would be even better if it could charge on standard Qi pads, but no such luck. Maybe there’s something about the size of the coils, who knows?

Ah, OK, that does make a difference. I have a Plantronics headset that has a similar charging point, and it is great to be able to almost throw it onto the charger and just have it work.

But - the heatset also has a micro USB port built in, so if I don't have the charging point (or the charging case, which it also came with), I can just use a USB cable. This seems the best approach, IMO.

It can charge on many, but not all, standard qi pads. I’d swear that launched years ago. I use one when car-camping.

Apple could have made ”mini Qi” if they wanted to, but they don’t want to. It’s been their MO for decades.

I could see making this argument with a nice cable like USB-C, but micro-USB is legacy garbage.