The PopGrip Jumpstart is a handheld battery bank/grip

PopSocket has one proposal: What if you could swap out the grip on your phone (which may or may not contain lip balm or a multitool) and an integrated one whenever you need to keep your phone charged and solid. Stick on the battery bank with the cable. hold on to it? That seems to be the idea behind its new PopGrip JumpStart, a 2,200mAh battery (we'll get to that number in a moment) that mounts to a standard PopSocket mount and plugs your phone into a pop-out USB-C or Lightning cable. Charges with (via Gizmodo).

It's a clever idea to be sure, but I have a few... Standard PopSockets are comfortable to use because they seem to be just the right size and shape. As you might have already guessed, though, the JumpStart is pretty big considering it's an entire battery bank and cable rather than a plastic circle. Simply put, it feels quite uncomfortable to hold.

Thankfully, it's swappable—you can attach and detach it from your phone by simply mounting it on the PopMount 2. If you have a grip with a swappable top that attaches either to your phone with adhesive or to one of the PopSockets sliding bands, you should be able to trigger the Jumpstart when your phone is running on low power. To charge the Jumpstart's battery itself, you use the USB-C port on the bottom (and if you plug it into your phone, it can forgo a charge, which is nice to see).

Unfortunately for MagSafe fans (warning: link contains karate), PopSockets says the JumpStart is not compatible with MagSafe Grip Bass. It's also not compatible with Otterbox's Symmetry or Defender cases that have built-in PopSockets. Coming back to MagSafe, though, it raises the question of why this accessory doesn't just use Qi charging — it would certainly be more convenient to PopSockets if it didn't have a USB-C and Lightning version to make.

The likely culprit is distance - between the phone and the case from the mount PopSocket wants you to mount it (the site says "the gel doesn't stick as well with naked iPhones"), which seems like it would be hard to guarantee that Wireless charging would be efficient or even possible. The company drilled a popsocket-shaped hole in the wireless charger to let its customers switch to wireless charging, which seems impractical for a mobile accessory. Still, it's a shame that the MagSafe can support either a PopSocket or a wireless charging pack, but not both combined.

Speaking of the MagSafe charging pack, there's an important note about the JumpStart when it comes to battery capacity — as we noted in our review of Apple's Snap-on Battery (which is similar to the JumpStart in some ways but very PopSockets). is not)-friendly), the number of milliamp-hours by itself doesn't tell the whole story. PopSocket estimates this will power your phone by up to 50 percent, though it depends on what phone you have.

However, I have to hand it over to PopSockets to make this product; I can see that people dedicated to living the PopSockets lifestyle are getting some benefit out of it. I just pray that their fingers don't cramp when they are charging their phone.