EcoFlow Energy Hat overview: A solar hat with photo voltaic panels

Value When Reviewed

$129

Greatest Costs Immediately: EcoFlow Energy Hat

$129

Carrying a hat once you’re spending time within the solar is right to guard your pores and skin and assist preserve you cool. However why not go a step additional and make the hat able to charging an iPhone? That’s the premise with the EcoFlow Energy Hat. It’s a solar hat with edges lined with photo voltaic panels. If the circumstances are proper, it could actually create photo voltaic vitality that can be utilized to cost a cellular system, reminiscent of an iPhone.

The Energy Hat instantly catches the attention. In contrast to standard outside clothes in inexperienced, brown, or pastel colours, the hat is black to match the black photo voltaic panels. The pitch-black colour and the creases on the brim had led to the considerably unexpected penalties: When making an attempt them on within the workplace, my co-workers teased me about Hogwarts–I’ve to confess, the comparability will not be too far-fetched. My fellow travellers on the route related the look with Nineteenth-century style. In any case, the hat appears fairly uncommon.

The plastic edges are creased alongside the photovoltaic components in order that the hat could be folded fairly comfortably–a transparent benefit over basic summer season hats, most of which don’t survive the primary journey in a bag with out visible loss. The sides are made of sturdy plastic, with the panels on the higher facet and a material lining on the backside, presumably to stop extreme perspiration.

The hat weighs simply 370 grams, and I didn’t have any discomfort throughout a five-hour hike with the hat both on my head or hanging my neck with the supplied hat strap. Solely in sturdy gusts of wind do the strong plastic brims react to a breeze–the wind virtually tore the hat off my head twice if it hadn’t been secured with the strap.

In dimension Medium-Massive (Massive-Further Massive can be out there), the brim is 14 centimeters broad, so the hat measures round 47 centimeters in diameter, greater than sufficient to reliably defend your face from the solar’s rays, even on a sunny day within the mountains.

The Energy Hat has two USB-A and USB-C ports on the underside of the brim.

Can the Energy Hat cost an iPhone?

Halyna Kubiv

I wore the photo voltaic hat on a hike within the Allgäu on April 6, 2025, and in accordance with Oberstdorf.de, the photo voltaic radiation on that day reached 1,000 watts per sq. meter round noon. It was very sunny with hardly any clouds within the sky.

EcoFlow states a most present of two.4 amperes for the Energy Hat. When related to an iPhone 16 and utilizing the USB-C charging cable (which helps Energy Supply) that’s included with the telephone, and when sporting the hat and related to the iPhone, the Photo voltaic Hat provided so little voltage that the iPhone acknowledged an influence supply and displayed the charging icon for a short while. Nevertheless, the iPhone was not charged; the share show on the battery didn’t improve. I measured a present of 0.15 to 0.87 amperes, and the worth by no means exceeded one ampere. The brim of the hat has a reasonably steep angle when sporting it, however no matter its place, solely 1 / 4 of the brim obtained direct daylight. The remaining is both within the shade or at such an unfavorable angle that the respective photovoltaic tile doesn’t obtain any vitality.

Halyna Kubiv

It was solely after I took off the hat and unfold it out on the bottom that I noticed a better amperage starting from 1 ampere to 1.38 amperes. On this spread-out state, the hat was related to the iPhone for round 20 minutes, throughout which the smartphone was charged by six proportion factors, from 43 per cent to 49 per cent. Underneath such excellent circumstances, the iPhone could possibly be charged from zero to one hundred pc in over 5 hours.

Do you have to purchase the EcoFlow Energy Hat?

The concept behind the Energy Hat is interesting: when you are out, you profit from photo voltaic vitality and use it to cost your individual units. Nevertheless, follow exhibits that this hat no less than requires excellent climate circumstances and a perfect orientation to be able to convert sufficient photo voltaic vitality into electrical energy. As a solar hat, nevertheless, the photo voltaic hat from EcoFlow is nearly excellent, it’s light-weight and the brim is broad sufficient to guard the face from the solar at most angles. If it had been half the value, this could be a transparent advice to purchase, however the mixture of a traditional solar hat and an influence financial institution is extra inexpensive.