Incase’s IconConnected Power Sleeve seems like an almost obvious product. It’s a laptop sleeve with a big 14,000mAh battery pack that can recharge your MacBook Pro on the go. The actual laptop-protecting sleeve part is basically just Incase’s existing Icon model, but with a hidden pocket for a USB-C cable and ports on the bottom to let you plug in a USB-C or regular USB Type-A cable to recharge your gadgets.
As someone who is almost constantly looking for a place to recharge when I’m out and about, especially at shows like CES, it seems like the perfect product for me. Except for one crucial problem: it doesn’t seem that you can actually recharge your MacBook Pro while it’s in the case.
It’s a shame, too, because the idea that you can save on carrying around an extra battery pack by integrating it into a laptop sleeve is a good one! It just seems so logical that you’d want to be able to charge your computer while it’s stowed away in your bag so that it’d be magically charged back to full when you take it out at work or your next class. I’m baffled as to why the IconConnected Power Sleeve wasn’t designed that way.
Alas, it isn’t meant to be, which leaves the IconConnected as a somewhat less useful version of what could have been. The IconConnected Power Sleeve comes in both 13-inch and 15-inch sizes for Apple’s two MacBook Pro models, and will cost $199.95 — which is pretty pricey, even for a USB-C battery that can charge a laptop — when it launches in Q3 2018.