The Best iPhone Accessory isn’t Made by Apple. It’s This 6mm Xiaomi Power Bank

There’s something deliciously ironic about the fact that the single best accessory I’ve ever used with my iPhone comes from a Chinese brand that most Australians associate with budget smartphones and robot vacuum cleaners.

The Xiaomi UltraThin Magnetic Power Bank has become an indispensable part of every day outings, every road trip, every interstate flight, and every long drive I’ve taken since late last year. If you carry an iPhone 17 Pro Max or an iPhone Air and you haven’t discovered this thing yet, you’re in for a treat.

The Irony Is the Point

Let’s address it head-on: Apple doesn’t make a MagSafe battery pack anymore. They discontinued the MagSafe Battery Pack a couple of years back, and in doing so, left a gaping hole in the iPhone accessory ecosystem. The product that has most convincingly filled that void isn’t from Mophie, Anker, Belkin, or any of the usual suspects you’d find at your local JB Hi-Fi store. It’s from Xiaomi.

That’s the central, slightly absurd truth of this review. You’re spending $2,000-plus on an iPhone 17 Pro Max, arguably the most premium consumer electronics device on the planet and the perfect companion for it is a $50 power bank from the same company that makes budget Android phones and compelling high end iPhone alternatives. And yet, here we are.

The Xiaomi UltraThin Magnetic Power Bank doesn’t just work well despite being a Xiaomi product. It works well because of the engineering and manufacturing discipline that Xiaomi brings to bear when they decide to take a product category seriously. And on this one, they’ve absolutely nailed it.

Design and Build Quality: Genuinely Excellent

At just 6 millimetres thick, the UltraThin is, as the name promises, absurdly slim. For context, the iPhone Air, already celebrated as one of the thinnest phones ever made at 5.6mm is only 0.4mm thinner than this power bank. When you snap it onto the back of your iPhone, the combined profile is barely noticeable in a jacket pocket or bag.

The housing is aluminium alloy with a smooth metallic finish that looks genuinely premium. This isn’t plasticky budget-gadget territory, it feels like something that belongs attached to a $2,000 phone. The phone-facing surface is finished in a fire-resistant fibreglass material, which protects both the power bank’s internals and your phone’s back from heat buildup during charging.

Four discreet LED indicators show the remaining battery level at a glance, and a single power button lets you start or stop charging on demand. It’s a clean, considered design with nothing extraneous. At 98 grams, it adds almost no perceptible weight to your phone.

Colour is understated with an anodised finish that won’t clash with whatever iPhone colour way you’ve chosen. Mine lives on the back of an Orange Pro Max, and it looks like it was designed specifically for it.

CCC Certification: Why This Actually Matters

Here’s something worth understanding if you’re in the market for any lithium-ion power bank: CCC certification (China Compulsory Certification, also called 3C certification) is China’s mandatory safety standard for electronics, broadly comparable to the CE marking required across the European Union.

For power banks and lithium-ion batteries specifically, CCC compliance isn’t optional. Since August 2024, China’s National Certification and Accreditation Administration mandated full CCC certification for all portable power products. The process involves rigorous product safety testing in certified Chinese laboratories, initial factory audits, and ongoing annual follow-up inspections. Products that fail to meet the required standards under GB 31241 (China’s national lithium-ion battery safety specification) cannot legally be manufactured, sold, or exported from China.

Why does this matter to travellers? Because the budget power bank aisle is littered with uncertified products using substandard cells, inadequate thermal management, and cut-rate protection circuitry. A cheap uncertified power bank is genuinely a fire risk. The CCC mark on the Xiaomi UltraThin tells you that its 10-point protection system and dual NTC temperature sensors have been independently validated — not just claimed in a product listing.

For anyone who’s nervous about packing lithium batteries in a carry-on bag (and you should give this at least a passing thought), certification matters. More on that in a moment.

Specifications: The Numbers That Count

Let’s get into the details, because this is where the UltraThin earns its keep.

Battery: 5,000 mAh silicon-carbon high-density cell. The use of silicon-carbon chemistry (rather than conventional lithium cobalt oxide) is what enables the extreme thinness without sacrificing capacity. You’re getting enough juice for a full charge on most smartphones — including one complete cycle on an iPhone 17 Pro Max — in a package that’s barely thicker than a credit card stack.

Wireless charging (MagSafe): The power bank magnetically snaps onto your iPhone using a precise magnetic array and delivers 7.5W wireless charging to iPhones — which is the current MagSafe standard for third-party accessories. To be transparent: some competing power banks now support the newer Qi2 standard at up to 25W, which would charge your iPhone faster wirelessly. The 7.5W output is on the conservative end of what’s available in 2026. However, for the “top-up while you use it” use case — phone magnetically attached to the back while you’re navigating, scrolling, or taking photos — 7.5W is perfectly functional. It keeps your battery climbing rather than dropping, which is ultimately the job.

Wired charging (USB-C): Pop in a cable and the UltraThin delivers up to 22.5W output, which is genuinely quick. For a fast fill while you’re sitting at a café or in a hire car, this is the mode to use. The same USB-C port handles input charging for the power bank itself, and the whole unit can be fully recharged in under two hours with a capable charger.

Simultaneous charging: The UltraThin can charge one device wirelessly via MagSafe while outputting via USB-C to a second device at the same time — handy if you’re running both a phone and earbuds.

Real-World Performance: Tested on 30 Flights

Here’s the part of this review that I think matters most, and it’s something you won’t find in a lab test.

I’ve been carrying the Xiaomi UltraThin (and its predecessor, the Super Slim 5000, which paved the way before the UltraThin launched) since October last year. In that time, I’ve taken it through airport security on no fewer than 30 flights — domestic routes across Australia and several international legs — and it has never once caused a second glance from security staff, prompted additional screening, or been flagged as problematic.

This matters enormously for frequent travellers. If you’ve ever had a power bank pulled from your bag at a security checkpoint, you know the particular misery of that experience — the frantic dig through your carry-on, the explanation, the secondary screening, the mild panic about whether you’re going to make your gate. The CCC-certified Xiaomi passes through X-ray machines without drama, every single time.

The reason almost certainly comes back to certification. Security staff — especially those in Australian airports familiar with lithium battery regulations — are increasingly aware of which products look legitimate and which don’t. A clearly marked, professionally manufactured power bank with visible safety certification markings reads differently to a no-brand brick from an online marketplace.

On the performance side, 30 flights of real-world use has revealed zero issues. The magnetic connection holds securely even in the overhead locker (not recommended as a charging method, but it’s been tested by accident). The temperature sensors have done their job — I’ve never noticed the unit running hot, even during back-to-back wireless charging sessions. The LED indicators remain accurate to the actual remaining capacity. Nothing has failed, degraded, or misbehaved.

With the iPhone Air: A Match Made in Engineering Heaven

If you own an iPhone Air, the UltraThin is your perfect companion in a way that borders on poetic. The Air was designed around the premise that a phone can be so thin it changes how you relate to it — and the UltraThin follows that same philosophy for its power bank. At 6mm, it snaps onto the back of the Air without creating a visual or tactile lump. The combined device is still thinner than most Android flagships.

Wireless charging at 7.5W suits the Air’s use case beautifully. You’re not going to be fast-charging the Air from dead to full via MagSafe — but for the road trip scenario (phone on the dashboard mount, UltraThin attached, slowly topping up while you navigate a remote drive) it’s precisely what you need.

With the iPhone 17 Pro Max: The Endurance Companion

The Pro Max is a different beast — a larger battery (approximately 4,685 mAh) and a power-hungry chip and display that can eat through a charge faster than you’d expect on a heavy day of filming, navigating, and hotspotting. The UltraThin’s 5,000 mAh capacity will get you most of the way through a full charge cycle wirelessly, and all the way there via USB-C at 22.5W.

My standard road trip setup: UltraThin magnetically attached during the first couple of hours of driving (slow but steady wireless top-up), then cabled in through the USB-C for a faster fill during a fuel stop. By the time I’m back on the road, both the phone and the power bank have been looked after.

Limitations Worth Knowing

In the spirit of honest reviewing, a couple of notes:

7.5W wireless is not the fastest. Competitors like the Ugreen MagFlow at a similar price point support Qi2’s 25W wireless charging standard, which charges iPhones significantly faster wirelessly. If wireless charging speed is your primary concern, the UltraThin isn’t the leader of the pack.

5,000 mAh is a single charge. This isn’t a power bank for a multi-day backcountry trip where you can’t plug anything in. It’s a day-trip companion, a flight survival tool, a “my phone is dying and I need it to last the evening” solution. If you need to charge multiple devices over multiple days without access to power, look at a higher-capacity unit.

Availability in Australia. At the time of writing, the UltraThin is primarily available through Xiaomi’s online channels and selected importers. It’s not yet the easiest product to find on a shelf at your local Officeworks, though this will likely change as global distribution catches up.

The Part That Tells You Everything: I Bought Six of Them

I’m aware that the most powerful endorsement in any product review isn’t a star rating or a conclusion paragraph. It’s what the reviewer actually does with their own money.

So here’s what I’ve done: I’ve purchased five additional units to give as gifts to family and friends. My partner has one. My parents have one each. Two close friends with iPhones received them. One went to a colleague who travels constantly for work.

Every one of those gifts was accompanied by the same message: this is the one, don’t bother looking at anything else.

When you find a product that you trust enough to put your name behind as a recommendation to the people closest to you — not a sponsored post, not an affiliate disclaimer, just a genuine “I think you’ll love this” — that’s a different category of endorsement. That’s what the Xiaomi UltraThin has earned.

The Verdict

The Xiaomi UltraThin Magnetic Power Bank is the best iPhone travel accessory available right now. Not the flashiest, not the highest-capacity, not the fastest wireless charger on the market — but the best overall package of design, build quality, safety certification, travel reliability, and practical performance for iPhone users who are actually on the move.

The irony that a Xiaomi product out-performs what Apple itself ever delivered in this category is funny if you think about it, and useful if you act on it.

Pick one up before your next road trip. Then buy five more for your friends.

Xiaomi UltraThin Magnetic Power Bank — Quick Specs

Road Trip Reviews tests all products in real-world conditions on Australian roads and travel routes. No sponsored content. All units purchased by the reviewer unless otherwise stated.

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