Mophie Juice Pack Helium for iPhone5

By Philip Van der Vossen on May 23rd, 2013

Mophie is a reasonably focused company. They make cases and accessories for your mobile devices, and their most popular products deliver extra power to those battery sucking gadgets. That allows them to be pretty damn good at what they do, and highly recommended by many of their users, as we found out when we began testing the Mophie Juice Pack Helium for iPhone 5.

Anyone who has an iPhone 5 will tell you that it can drain its battery wicked fast with all of its LTE goodness. On a normal day this isn’t a problem for us, but whenever we travel, it becomes an issue. So with two press trips over the past week, we found the perfect time to test out the Juice Pack Helium. Nearly every time the case was spotted by people on our trips, they went out of their way to either rave about their own Mophie device, or ask us our thoughts if they hadn’t yet experienced one.

We’ll refer to the press-release for some details :

The helium is mophie’s thinnest, lightest juice pack ever made, packing 80 percent more battery life into an ultra-thin profile and delivering edge-to-edge protection for the iPhone 5.

The new juice pack helium is mophie’s most innovative battery case to-date, engineered with a 1500 mAh battery for on-demand power, soft interior cushion for full device protection, and micro USB connection for effortless pass-through charging.

Additional embedded elements such as a simple toggle switch for charging, discreet LED power indicator, and forward-facing speaker ports for enhanced sound are features that have evolved with each generation of the juice pack, and blend beautifully with the new, slimmed down design of the helium.

The first battery case to market for the iPhone 5, the helium retails for $79.95 and comes in two colors – dark metallic and silver. Soon after its release, they actually came out with a second model for iPhone 5, which provides more advanced features and more battery life for an additional $20.

In our testing, the Juice Pack Helium performed as advertised. It extended our battery life effectively, and even after a long day of usage, our iPhone still had enough juice left for some late night Instagram posting. On the back of the case sits a button, four LEDs, and a switch. Upon pressing the button, the LEDs light up to indicate how full the battery is. The case powers your iPhone only when you flip the switch to on (green). Mophie recommends turning on the case only after your iPhone’s built-in battery drops below 20 percent.

Both the phone and the case charged relatively quickly through the micro-usb port. That port was a mixed blessing, in that we definitely have more micro-usb than lightning cables, but found connecting the cable much more frustrating.

When we first began using the case, the added length at the bottom required retraining of some muscle memory, but that only lasted about a day. The added length also creates an issue accessing the headphone jack, for which they provided an extension piece. We actually tested with three sets of headphones that didn’t require the adapter, but if you still use the stock ear buds (WHY?) you will need to use that piece.

The case is smooth and slides in and out of pockets easily. The added size obviously takes away from the beautiful design of the iPhone itself much like any case would, but we were impressed with how tight the package actually was. Mophie excels at elegant design themselves, so while it’s a different style, the case is definitely well designed and well-built.

The iPhone slides easily into the two piece case, with the battery contained in the top portion, and the connectors housed in the smaller bottom piece. The connections themselves seem robust enough to not break under normal usage. Unlike many cases on the market, the Juice Pack Helium is both easy to put on, and take off of your iPhone. That is ideal, as we feel many customers will utilize this case only at times when they feel like they would need the extra juice. Their other favorite case will suffice for everyday usage. However if you need more battery every day, the Juice Pack Helium is certainly capable of being an everyday case.