****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
The BX12 Pro Max is the latest in a long line of solid performing iPhone battery cases. At 6000 mAh, I believe this is their largest capacity case? It’s certainly the beefiest that I’ve used, and I believe this is my 5th model.Before going into details, the most important thing about a battery case is its performance. After a week of use I can confirm the BX12 works as well as previous models I’ve owned. It really is as simple as the product description says: tap the button on the back to check the charge (denoted by four LED’s). Hold the button for a few seconds to begin charging, and hold it again to turn it off. The 6000 mAh battery is enough to restore the phone from near-death back to 100% and still have some juice left. After using this model for just a week I cannot speak as to how it will hold up over time, but past cases performed excellently over multiple years. If those cases’ batteries degraded over time, I honestly could not tell.Now for the pros:• This is a solid case: hard plastic with a grippy, textured finish on the sides. Carrying the iPhone 12 Pro Max naked makes me nervous; carrying it in this case absolutely does not. Even better: Alpatronix included a screen protector (which I have not installed, but it’s nice to have it if you want the extra reassurance).• The case is surprisingly light to have such a high capacity battery. It doesn’t make the phone as bulky as you might expect.• Volume and power buttons seem solid. They appear to be connected to the rest of the case on all sides, so I think these will fare better than previous models (which were connected via tabs which could break off over time). Also, the mute switch is easily accessible.• The back of the case does not obfuscate any of the camera lenses. Some other brand cases have been known to have issues where use of the flash bounces off the back of the case, blowing out images. That does NOT happen with this case.• This case supports Lightning pass-through. No more microUSB cables! Connecting a Lightning cable works as it should with no issues. Doing so will first charge the phone, then begin recharging the case’s battery. The case itself charges at a steady pace, fully recharging in a few hours when connected via Lightning cable. I have not tried recharging it fully via wireless, as I suspect that would take much, much longer.• The BX12 Pro Max supports wireless charging (though not MagSafe charging, as discussed under the cons). It seems to wirelessly charge as fast as the phone, neither any faster or slower.• Going back to this being a solid case, the BX12 Pro Max offers a very snug fit due to how the phone fits. There is absolutely NO CHANCE that the phone will accidentally pop or slide out.And the cons:• Past battery cases had a satin-like finish which felt nicer than this model’s hard plastic . But to be fair, that finish tended to peel off over time, so there was a definite trade-off between comfort and performance. I don’t foresee any similar issues here.• The case DOES make an already-large phone even larger, even if it’s by a smaller-than-expected amount. But if you bought the Pro Max model, I wouldn’t expect that to be a big concern.• While the volume and power buttons are solid, they are mushy and don’t provide great feedback. Texture-wise, they blend in with the rest of the case, and it’s sometimes hard to tell if a press registered. This was mostly an initial annoyance that I quickly got used to.• This case is NOT a MagSafe product. While it will technically charge if you position the disc in just the right spot, there are no magnets in the case to ‘grab’ the disc.• I mentioned above that the case affords a VERY snug fit for the phone. This is due to how the phone goes in and out of the case, which Alpatronix has changed in recent models. The top quarter of the case (from the bottom of the camera lenses and up) is silicone, which you peel backward to either insert or remove the phone. Getting the phone into the case is easy; removing it is not. How annoying this is will entirely depend on how often you want to take the phone out of the case (or if ever), so this gripe could well be a non-issue for most. Personally, however, I preferred the old design, where the top part of the case detached, allowing for easily sliding the phone in/out.The BX12 Pro Max continues the Alpatronix tradition of well-made, thoughtfully constructed, and high performing battery cases. While I personally have a few minor quibbles with this model, they are nowhere near enough to dissuade me from using or recommending it.Like: This is my second purchase. Meets my needs. Fast charging.Dislike: the first unit I had only lasted a year. Part of the charging port broke off and lodged inside my phone, resulting in a trip to the Apple Store. Makes the phone heavy.Overall a good purchase and does what it is designed to do!This case gives the iPhone 12 Pro Max a lot of life. The phone itself already lasts quite awhile, like all day with normal to moderate use, and then the case charges this phone two more times. I don't have to charge my phone everyday or even every two days...The case is also really rugged and super simple to insert and take out your phone.I wasn't much for the screen, but I intended to use it, but the sticky side got something on it and it was impossible to clean off from the sticky side so I had to junk it. More my fault and not really being careful with something I wasn't enthusiastic about in the first place anyway.The one thing I really wish they had done a better job on for this case are the buttons. They are hard to press or even know if you are pressing. Makes it annoying to change volume or take a pic of the screen or lock the phone and so on. The buttons are kinda frustrating really.The only other thing I noticed about this case, and this could be a defect in the one I have, the case is suppose to charge the phone first, and then the case, but every so often, and it's often, when I have the case plugged in to the wall the phone won't be charging, the case will be full charge, and I'll be using the phone and it goes to low power and I realize it's not charging the phone. I tried a bunch of things to get it to work correctly and charge the phone and the only reliable solution is to place the case and phone on a wireless charger. As soon as you do it's reset and the phone will charge from a wired connection again. So if you don't use a wireless charger at all, you'll get annoyed at your phone suddenly being out of battery and you've had it plugged in all day. This could be a defect and I haven't called them yet so I'll update this after I have.This is the second case I’ve had from this company and am completely saturated with the performance. I dropped the other case and it continued to work for more than a year even though cracked. Can’t say enough about the quality and expecting the same from this one. Completely trust this supplier.I really like the weight and feel in my hand as this product. It has one major flaw that I have found however, when my iPhone is in the case and I connect a case to power it will charge my iPhone without issue however never charges the case to more than one bar. I actually returned one and asked for a replacement and the second one seems to do the same thing. If you pull the phone away from the charging plug in the external battery case then the external battery charges without issue. Still trying to decide if I want to keep this and deal with this rather annoying issue or not. I would think that if after eight or nine hours of sleep with the external case being plugged in that it would be fully charged as well as my phone . This does not seem to be the case however———————————Ok had to revise as I finally discovered the secret of this thing. You need to use a fast charge cable if you want to charge the battery while the phone is inside. For weeks I would have it plugged in all night long only to have the external battery not charged in the morning. I then took the phone out and charge them separately. Then bought myself some fast chargers and lo and behold this morning after charging all night the external battery is actually fully chargedWhat I expected, charges phone fast and charges fully once and next time a bit more than half. Comes with a screen protector and feels lighter than other battery cases.I bought one of these and a cheap $20 case from China that stops working after one drop, I went through 3 cheap cases wanting to save money and now just ordered my second Apla case and decided to write a review, it’s a great case well worth money no lie.It is very heavy
