Most of them have overheat protection, so after a few tries you’ll have to wait for them to cool down, but they also have enough power for multiple starts. You just clamp them directly onto your battery terminals, turn it on, and after a few seconds, try to start your car. Portable jump starters are much safer and easier to use than jumper cables, although most of them, can’t provide as much power. Almost all of them have USB ports as well, and we often use one in the AutoGuide Garage as an oversized battery bank to charge phones, so they’re useful in all sorts of emergencies. And of course, almost everyone has left a dome light or the headlights on, or an accessory plugged into an always-on 12V power port.įortunately, you can now buy one of the best portable car jump starters, charge it up, and forget about it for six months or more (they do need topping up occasionally, especially if they get very cold or very hot repeatedly). Even in new cars and trucks, charging systems can fail, or a battery drain can slowly siphon power away while sitting. Even if you do everything right, they don’t last forever: You should expect to replace one every five to seven years, depending on where you live and how you use your car. There are a lot of reasons to end up with a dead battery. If you had a dead or weak battery and you were on your own, you had to get to a phone or flag down another motorist to have a chance of getting going again. Everyone else carried (and still should) jumper cables, which require two cars and enough knowledge not to short them out. They were heavy lead-acid automotive batteries that only garages and tow truck drivers used. Some cables, however, are better than others.Between the invention of the self starter and the end of the 20th Century, the best portable car jump starters weren’t something you carried with you. You might think that jumper cables are all the same, and to an extent, that’s true-they’re copper wires that deliver power. Jumper cables are a vital part of any jump starter. A battery charger is better if you have access to a power outlet and have enough time to charge the battery, while a jump starter is better in a pinch for those who need to get on the road right away. Our recommendation? Having both a jump starter and a battery charger can be helpful. Plus, they can come to the rescue if you have a faulty alternator, as they can allow you to get your car up and running without having to worry about your alternator recharging your battery. They also have to plug into a power outlet, which is less portable. Battery chargers take at least a few hours to recharge a car battery, which is not ideal for those needing to get on the road quickly. Unlike a jump starter, a charger recharges your car's battery, which is handy in some situations. Lifewire / Tony Mitera What About a Battery Charger? The portability outweighs the downside of having to keep the device charged up. We generally recommend buying a portable jump starter over a plug-in one. Instead of having a decent-sized battery built-in, you have to connect them to a power outlet-meaning that if you’re in a parking lot with a dead battery, you’re out of luck. Plug-in chargers, on the other hand, are much less portable.The only downside is that you must charge them after use, which can take several hours. Portable jump starters have a built-in battery, meaning they can be used on the go whenever you need them.Jump starters come in both portable and plug-in varieties: Do you have a big truck or a smaller car? Do you have a fleet of vehicles to maintain? Do you have storage in the car or your garage? Where will you most likely need the jump starter: At your home base or on the road? How much space do you have to dedicate to a device you hopefully will never need? There are a few factors to consider when picking the right jump starter. Lifewire / Tony Mitera What to Look For in a Portable Jump Starter
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