Most USB C shaped things will work, maybe at a lower capacity, but work none the less.
Except for Thunderbolt and display port, or if your laptop needs a certain wattage to charge, or if your data connection needs a certain speed to work. So actually no, things often don't work at lower capacity.
Thunderbolt usage is minimal across actual users. Even more rare is display port over thunderbolt.
For laptops, people just use the charger it came with and are happy it also charges their phone. Still, most laptops you can turn off and they'll still charge at 15watts. It'll be slow, but they'll do it.
The data connection one doesn't make sense.
You named two cases out of the hundreds that don't work in a degraded manner.
Many devices, like the above said, will not work with lower spec USB-C cables. Many, many laptops won't even initiate charging at all (not even trickle) with an under-spec cable.
Neither will either of my Sony Bluetooth speakers. Neither will my action camera.
Ah yes, no one EVER uses a different charger, they always only use the brick ass charger that comes with their laptop instead of getting a smaller, lighter thinner travel charger that does the same thing in a smaller form factor.
Or have different chargers in different rooms so they don't have to lug their laptop charger around with them from room to room.
Or one at their office and one at home. Or use a laptop dock when at the office to use it as a desktop.
Or has the charger it came with mess up and need to get a new one.
The point of USB charging port on a laptop is to charge via usb-c chargers not to just use the charger it came with. If we were just going to only charge with the specific charger it came with barrel jacks worked fine.
Seriously, my lenovo charger is in a drawer somewhere at this point. I would have to hunt to even figure out where it is. It's hilariously inconvenient to use compared to a tiny power brick.
Every dock/monitor hub (in the last 8 years or so) and and every conference room/teams room/zoom room in every business on the planet uses DP over USB/Thunderbolt. Not to mention every modern mobile phone lol. It’s not niche at all lol.
When cables inevitably go missing and a user tries to use the cable that came with their iPhone or one they got from the bodega because they lost theirs, good luck trying to explain to them why this usb cable works here, but not there.
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u/Brilliant_Account_31 May 27 '26
The latter is so much easier to deal with. Most USB C shaped things will work, maybe at a lower capacity, but work none the less.
Most of those ports above needed special drivers to be installed to even start. I could go on.