April 28, 2026 - The European Union has now extended its unified charging rule to laptops.
From today, every new laptop sold in the EU must come with a USB-C charging port.
This isn't brand new - the EU already forced phones, tablets, headphones, cameras and a bunch of other small gadgets to switch to USB-C back in December 2024. After more than a year, they're now moving on to laptops.
Most big brands are already prepared. Companies like Dell, ASUS, Lenovo, Apple, HP, and Microsoft have pretty much made USB-C their standard charging port already. Apple can still keep its MagSafe connector, but they have to include USB-C as well - they can't make MagSafe the only charging option.
The EU's main reason for doing this is pretty simple: make things more convenient for people and reduce electronic waste. They say Europeans throw away or leave unused chargers that add up to about 11,000 tons of e-waste every year. With one common charger for phones, tablets, and now laptops, the hope is that people won't need to keep buying or keeping so many different cables.
This new rule is part of an update to the EU's Radio Equipment Directive. It basically says these devices need to have a proper USB-C port that follows the official standard.
So yeah, the era of carrying around a bunch of different chargers is slowly coming to an end in Europe.
