Every iPhone user probably had one lighting cable from them. This was an annoying issue and it drove third-party vendors to create braided cables that could withstand more abuse.
Apple seems to be exploring the least ways to make its cables more resilient. According to a patent file that AppleInsider first noticed, Apple was working on a ‘cable with variable stiffness’ that gets thicker to the ports.
Lightning cables are known to have thick connection points. This is what Apple internally refers to as the strain relief sleeve. Although the tips of Apple cables are intended not to weaken the cable, the areas often become pressure and kink points. Apple has acknowledged equally much in its patent filing.
“Apart from the fact that the cable is locally stiffer, the strain relief sock also thickens the cable at the ends. In some cases, the added thickness may not have been desired,” reads the patent file.
To circumvent this, Apple is in fact designing a cable that has denser material to the points that decrease. The image below shows how it works.
Apple is also concerned about how far a cable can bend. It defines a minimum bending radius as ‘the smallest radius at which the cable can be bent without a bend’ where ‘the minimum bending radius can be, for example, eight to twelve times the cable diameter.’
Granted, these are all patents, so there’s a chance that none of these designs can ever reach consumers. And as rumors suggest the iPhone 13 may be inflexible, it’s a bigger reason for Apple to skip innovations over cables and go straight to wireless charging.
It is still unlikely that MacBooks will be useless in the near future, or ever. An improved cable is therefore a welcome addition for anyone who is constantly running. Let’s hope that when Apple releases an improved cable design, it’s shipped with the upcoming MacBook Pro with M1X.