Google will stop include charging plugs in the boxes for its phone.
The company will instead assume that people have enough of the charging bricks already – or that they can charge it from a computer or other device.
It is just the latest major manufacturer to drop the plugs. Apple and Samsung have done the same, and the move looks set to become standard within the phone industry.
Google told The Verge that it had made the decision because there was no longer a need to include the chargers given that most people still had one.
The same argument has been made by other companies that have already dropped the chargers from their boxes, instead shipping with just the wire to plug it in.
The Pixel 5A – recently pushed out in a new quiet release – will be the last of Google’s phones to include the charger, it said. That suggests the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro, which are both due for release later this year, are likely to be the first to go without.
Google did not specifically point to the environmental impact of leaving out the chargers, though its rivals have. When Apple made a similar announcement, for instance, it said that dropping the plugs from the iPhone and Apple Watch would together be equivalent to removing 500,000 cars from the road each year.
The decision also brings cost savings, which have not typically been passed onto the consumer. Apple did appear to reduce the price of the iPhone or Apple Watch when they shipped without a plug, and Google gave no indication that it would do the same.
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