Quick review
The good
The not-so-good
At $150, the Belkin Charging Grip for Nintendo Switch 2 is one of the more expensive options for adding magnetic power like Apple’s own MagSafe. But MagSafe this certainly is not.
While a lot of what you might think about Belkin as a brand probably relates to cables and mobile phone accessories, the brand has branched out in a wide array of directions over the years, including products such as headphones and gaming accessories.
That’s exactly what the Belkin Charging Grip for Nintendo Switch 2 is; it’s a relatively simple three-part “case” for a Nintendo Switch 2 that incorporates both a modular battery and side grips.
Design
A lot of third-party gaming peripherals tend towards the showy with bright colours or licensed character designs to make them stand out.
That’s not what Belkin has with the Belkin Charging Grip for the Switch 2. The variant that Belkin sent my way was the basic black version, though it appears that Belkin also sells a light green or violet coloured set instead if you fancy a little colour on your Switch 2.
The Belkin Charging Grip for the Switch 2 comes in three basic parts: a pair of simple plastic grips that click onto the sides of the left and right joy-cons, a backplate that clicks onto the back of the Switch 2 console, and a battery back that can then magnetically attach to that plate, with a small USB-C cable that either hides in its back or loops up to the top USB-C port on the Switch 2 console for charging purposes.
The Joy-Con grips are very basic in just about every way. They’re certainly not hard to install or remove at will, but they’re also very plain.
You would have to need to use a widened grip for them to make much sense by themselves, especially at the charging grip’s $149 asking price. I got used to their presence, but I can’t entirely say that I thought they changed the way that I played.
It’s also worth noting if you do like using the Switch 2’s included “dogface” style controller that the Belkin Grips won’t fit into that in any way at all. It’s a case of one or the other, but not both.
Your grip tastes are naturally enough a massively subjective matter depending on your particular digital dexterity; I can totally accommodate the idea that some folks with larger hands might find the standard Joy-Con size way too small for longer gaming comfort, and for them a grip might be a must-have inclusion to make gaming possible at all.
The backplate is quite thin and, as a result, isn’t going to protect your Switch 2 from too many bumps and knocks. The upside here is that it’s styled to allow the Switch 2’s inbuilt kickstand to neatly slide out when desired, and it’s also thin enough to allow the whole unit to slide into the Switch 2 dock for larger screen gaming.
Performance
The real point of the Belkin Charging Grip’s backplate is its tiny metallic indents that match up with one side of the included 10,000mAh battery, allowing it to magnetically attach to the back of the Switch 2 for on-the-go charging and gaming in one.
This works quite well, though you’d be hard pressed to find an accompanying carrying case that will incorporate both grips installed and battery in place at the same time.
The battery pack itself isn’t an entirely new play from Belkin — it’s had similar products available since the Switch 2 launched — but it’s nice enough in design terms with a simple LED display that gives you a battery life number as it discharges. The charging output cable is fixed, though it does have an external USB-C port for recharging purposes.
Belkin being Belkin, you could always buy one of their USB-C cables to manage that charging process, though there isn’t one included in the box. Given you practically get a cable with nearly every device today, that is a bit of a surprise, though won’t be a deal breaker for most.
The battery pack can charge at up to a claimed 30W, which means that it’s suitable for both charging a Switch 2 and also a range of faster charging smartphones, though it won’t typically meet the requirements of some higher power USB-PD devices such as laptops.
That’s not what it’s designed for, but of course I tested this. Your results may vary, but as an example, I could get a MacBook Air M4 to accept it as a charger, albeit a slow one, and one that sapped the battery pretty quickly if I used it to power a laptop up. Again, this isn’t the point.
The battery pack can do a good job of keeping a Switch 2 charged up, though I did discover that it’s a little more fussy when it comes to taking charge into its own cells.
Plugging it into an original Switch charger saw it take on power, but at a glacial rate, and the same was true for the charger that comes with the Steam Deck.
On slightly lower-spec chargers, it handled charging a lot faster, which feels counter-intuitive, but almost certainly points to its own power management being on the heavily conservative side. That’s probably a good thing for battery longevity — and avoiding house fires — but it’s worth keeping in mind if you were planning to use a faster charger with it.
What we liked
The battery pack is easily the best part of Belkin’s Switch 2 Charging Grip, though. That’s partly because the grips are so very basic, but also kind of inherent in the name, no?
It’s certainly why you might want to buy it, though the catch here is that $149.95 is quite a premium price for a 10,000mAh battery pack with limited outputs.
What needs work?
The pricing, ultimately.
There’s little functionally wrong with the Belkin Charging Grip for the Switch 2, but you are paying a premium for the convenience of a magnetically attached battery pack, as distinct from running a cable to a more standard battery pack.
If you only wanted the grip, you can get that for around $50, but again that suggests that a 10,000mAh battery is worth some $100 by itself just because of its shape… which feels like some weird “value” calculus to me.
Final thoughts (TLDR)
The Belkin Charging Grip for Nintendo Switch 2 does have an interesting design, and having a compact battery pack that can keep you gaming for several hours – it’ll vary depending on the game you’re playing, naturally enough – beyond its normal battery capacity has a lot of appeal.
The problem here is that you really are paying a premium for that, because outside of the battery pack and the somewhat neat way that it magnetically attaches to the back of the protective case, there’s not a whole lot to this particular kit. The grip part doesn’t feel particularly special or nicely styled, just functional, and at this kind of price I’d really want a little more than that.
Ultimately, there are better options for the money, unless you’re really drawn to that magnetic feature because yes, magnets and power are both handy to have. Maybe.
