Magtame Cables Review: Coiled Magnetic Cables Reinvent the Cable Experience

Magtame Cables Review

As I wandered the vast Sands Convention Center space at CES 2024, I was attracted to a table filled with cables. The cables were piled a foot high, but unlike a traditional table filled with cables, these cables weren’t in bags, neatly labeled or strewn haphazardly, intertwined and tangled. These cables were coiled around themselves, easily distinguished from one another, and just as easily picked up without the need to pull them through wrapped knots of other cables.

Innovations come in big sizes and small. The Magtame innovation is on the small side. People might not even notice it when it’s in use. But their cables reinvent cables in multiple ways. They combine the nylon outer cover that has finally penetrated standard manufacturer cables and pair them with more robust connectors. No more cracked cables with exposed wires. No more bent connectors flopping around at the end of the cable, just waiting to be pulled from the last dangling wires. But those aren’t the most important innovations. Others already make rugged cables.

Magtame changes the game with embedded magnets. The cables manage themselves, wrapping in stacks or circles depending on the design. No Velcro. No tie wraps or wires. Just a cable that quickly uncoils and just as quickly spins back to a coiled configuration for storage or travel.

As an analyst and a reviewer, you can imagine how many cables I have in boxes and bags around the house, in office drawers, and in boxes in the garage. Over time, I think magnetic cables will become the norm, except in the smallest of sizes. That will change how hardware manufacturers package their own products, and it will make for neater kits.

What we like

Pros

• Magnetic to stay coiled
• Rugged
• MiFi-certified Lightning cables and Thunderbolt Cables

Not only are the Magtame cables great at being well-managed cables, but they are also great cables. I tested the 60W and 240W varieties of the coiled version. These are known as the O-MagCable. They come in silver and black. The O-MagCable stacks its magnets, so the cable ends up in a circular stack. The magnets align so they can atop one another. The C version wraps into flat, stackable loops. To be clear, the cables do not simply return to a predefined stack, but putting them in a stack or coil requires minimal effort from the owner.

Fashion-forward owners can adopt Magtame cables as a bracelet—transhumanism without the implants.

Magtame created rugged cables combining a number of layers of protection. The nylon braided wire wears better than exposed plastic. The typical TPE-coated wire bundle lives under the Magtame nylon exterior. Each wire bundle is wrapped in mylar film. The actual wire is 4-pin, 18-gauge, which will wear better than lower-gauge wire.

The 60W cables include a 3A chip for managing power, while the 240W version includes a 5A chip.

With the move to Thunderbolt 5, the Apple-Intel port will become the standard interface on most laptops, even if some of those ports are still Thunderbolt 4 for the next several years. USB-C has become a confusing universal standard. The connectors all look the same, at least where the business end of the cable meets the port. Inside the cable, various chips offer different technologies. Magtame’s connectors include chips, for instance, that manage voltage.

Thunderbolt 4 and 5 go well beyond voltage regulation, offering an array of single cable capabilities, not just power or data transfer, but video and network connectivity. For those features to work, the cable needs to be a certified Thunderbolt cable. Like Apple’s MiFi certification, Magtame has recently licensed Thunderbolt technology for their 20Gbps data transfer cable. This does not, however, seem to be a full Thunderbolt 4 or 5 cable with requisite testing and certification (their “Thunderbolt” cable lists as Thunderbolt “compatible,” not compliant), but it’s a step in the right direction.

So, while the Magtame cables are great as basic, fast charging and fast data transfer, they will not support the speeds or features of Thunderbolt. We’ll see if the company licenses Thunderbolt as the technology becomes even more ubiquitous.

Many cable applications don’t require all the features of Thunderbolt. They just need to pass power and data at reasonably high rates. For those applications, the Magtame cables offer a new cable organizing experience built atop its well-made cables. A great combination.

Note: I removed the sustainability score from this review because I did not have an opportunity to see the cables in their original packaging.

Most Magtame cables come in 1m and 1.5m lengths.

What could be improved

Cons

• Heavier than other cables
• No labels

Most innovations involve trade-offs, and the Magtame cables are no different. The cost of magnetic cables comes in the form of weight. The Magtame cables are noticeably heavier than other cables of similar lengths. I think the trade-off between self-organizing and messy, fragile cables is a no-brainer.

Finally, at least for the evaluation units I received (from the pile, not in a package), some kind of identification of capability would be useful. I had to image match to figure out which cables I received.

Magtame Cables: The bottom line

Well-manufactured nylon cables with robust connectors—with magnets that make organizing them simple and efficient. In a bag full of other tech, the slight weight difference won’t be noticed, but the ability to quickly grab a cable and put it to use will be.

Magtame provided the Magtame Cables for review. Images courtesy of Magtame unless otherwise noted.

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