One of the most obvious issues with the Lucid Air right now is the wireless phone charger. Right now, the way the Lucid Air implemented this phone charger is just simply bad. I do wonder why Lucid Motors implemented it this way, I do have some suspicions…

Phones Don’t Fit In The Charger

The most obvious issue with the wireless phone charger is that most modern phones do not fit properly. I went to a showroom a few weeks ago and I attempted to put my iPhone 13 Pro (not Max) into the slot and the showroom representative cautioned me not to. I tried it anyway and no, it did not fit well with the standard Apple iPhone case.

Here is a video clip from Jon Rettinger that starts at the 18:34 mark in the video of him trying to get his phone to charge and it is bad. He also said he tried six different phones and all had issues.

There Is Only One Charger

There is also two phone slots in the compartment, but only one will charge your phone. The other slot has no wireless charging. Having two places to wireless charge your phone is probably something that should have been added but maybe there were complications with the upcoming Apple Wireless CarPlay to support that? I am not sure.

Physical Slot vs Not Charging Pad

To me, sticking a phone in a slot, within a compartment is not convenient. I would personally prefer a flat surface to lay the phone on that has nice grip and also wireless charges. I know several auto manufacturers have wireless charging trays, like the BMWs.

You get into the car and you just want to drop your phone down on a tray. I want my phone to be at easy reach, in case I need to get to it. I do not want to fetch it from a tight slot, under an arm rest. Maybe I am out of the norm here?

Will It Be Fixed?

I am not sure how this can be fixed unless they take apart the armrest and redo how the charger hardware works. The Lucid Owners Forums have comments saying that Lucid Motors is aware of the issue and this is on their list to fix. But this is not a software fix that can be fixed with an over the air software update. This requires something to be done physically to the car to address.

Here are some quotes from the forum on customers being told it is being worked on:

Apparently, it is on their list as many customers have brought it up and my contact said they are working on something to address the issue because when originally designed it was not for the newer generation of larger phones.

Correct. I’ve been told they are redesigning the part and will provide it as a replacement when requested once complete

Trick To Get Your Phone To Charge

One Lucid Air owner posted in the forums a “trick” to get your iPhone Max to charge without fail, this is what he said:

The “trick” to getting it to charge without shoving it in all the way is to push it in until the Camera Bump causes it to stop. Pushing it in further will cause the phone to not be fully flush with the charging pad. If the phone does not start to charge right away, pull the phone toward you and then press back against the charging pad. This seems to make it start charging. At this point you can push it in all the way, although there is no need to wear out the charging pad rubber or your phone’s leather.

Just Sad 📱

I assume they used the snug fitted slot to ensure the phone fits right where it needs to, in order for the charging to work. But it seems like it back fired and they did not take into account the variations of phone sizes.

Of course, I do not have the car in hand yet so I do not have personal experience with it outside of testing it in a showroom, watching the reviews and listening to owners complain about it in the forums.

But I am hopeful Lucid Motors has some sort of idea on how to resolve this issue.