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Someone made an Android phone with a Lightning port for some reason
- An engineer has added a Lightning port to an Android phone.
- The phone is able to charge and conduct data transfers via the Apple port.
- The same engineer previously added a USB-C port to an iPhone.
An enterprising engineer grafted a USB-C port onto an iPhone late last year, making for a welcome upgrade over Apple’s Lightning connector. However, this same engineer has now gone in the other direction.
Kenny Pillonel posted a video showing what he calls the first Android phone with a Lightning port (h/t: Engadget), adding the connector to a Samsung Galaxy A51. The tinkerer added that the port does indeed support charging and data transfers.
Pillonel noted that he deliberately timed the video to go live on April 1, but added that it was indeed a real project that was done for fun.
The engineer told Engadget that bringing a Lightning port to an Android phone was easier than his USB-C iPhone project for two reasons.
The first is that I’m getting better at it because I’m learning new things every day, so hopefully I can finish these mods faster and faster. The second reason is that the quality of the finished product is nowhere near what it was for the iPhone.
Nevertheless, Pillonel said Apple’s cables were a challenge as they’ll only charge Apple devices. So he had to essentially trick the cables into thinking the Galaxy A51 was an Apple phone.
We’d strongly argue that this is a major downgrade given how pervasive the USB-C standard is in the first place, being used on a ton of devices (from phones and tablets to computers and smart home gadgets). But it’s still cool to see a Lightning port technically working on an Android phone.