Because you wouldn't buy another one
this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2026
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They do, just not from Apple.
Imo, it is about the durability of ports as well. You make cable too tough, you may damage the C port. And not everyone has the tools to fix it. Kinda the torx tradeoff, you destroy bits, but the impact drill and screws are fine. More "easily" recoverable damage at the cost of cables. They ain't cheap though.
Are you saying they're mistakenly reenforcing the parts that DON'T cause total failure?
I'm saying the only ones left are the super durable ones. All the weak/failed ones are gone. There were plenty of these cables that fell apart that we don't remember that aren't around today because they went in the trash. I remember several such cables in my own house growing up.
They also received far more abuse than usb cables. We don't generally anchor one end of a usb cable and then walk around erratically for hours everyday within the range of the cable (and now and then pushing it) with the device on the other end of the cable.
Those cables _were_engineered for more abuse.
Well, the good ones were haha. All of them should have been, but there were some bargain bin ones out there that failed if you looked at them wrong.
Because crosstalk on 2 or 4 wires is way easier to deal with then on ~~24~~ 18 wires
Who's got 24 wires?
USB C
Forgive the pedantry, but the USB-C standard is 18 wires (feeding 24 pins).
Dang, you are right.
I think anker makes good charging cable, i have one that is still doing good after 8 years of abuse, plus its really long
The cause is very likely just mundane - phone cord manufacturing supply chains disintegrated as landline phones themselves disappeared, so that kind of cabling just isn't economical anymore to scale for commodity use. Deviating from standards is expensive.
Manufactured obsolescence.
No! I still shudder to think of how those phone cords stole my innocence of intractable topology problems.
Fatigued, I sometimes ask myself why I still bother exploring the ruins of the information super highway. Then I come across a post like this and let out a hearty laugh! Thank you, friend.
Glad to hear it!
They can. But then you won't have to keep giving them money.
They do make coiled USB-C cables. I got one for my laptop on Aliexpress.
Two things:
- the land-line phone handset cord probably got less use than your charger cable.
- look after your things!!! I have never had a USB cable of any kind end up this way. This kind of damage only comes from abusing the heck out of them.
I'm guessing you didn't grow up in the age of landlines with corded handsets. They got used all to hell back when they were THE way of contacting people remotely. Kitchen phones in any home with a mother got used a lot, with the cables being dragged all over the room and sometimes into the next.
I did, it's just that our family (including my mother) looked after our things and the phone never got ruined...
- No. I have had several of these cables. All of them fell apart. I used electrical tape to hold them for a while but the problem kept spreading down the cable. The material they used is the problem.
Only cheap cables end up this way, other you can easy reforce or fix with these and a lighter forever. Sets of these in every DIY shop/mall for a few bucks.
Not necessarily.
I remember this very good charging cable from a premium phone I bought way back when. Truly felt premium in the hands with a matte finish and soft to the touch.
Lo and behold, after 6 months of regular use the cable started staining, and cleaning only made worse. Then after a year it frayed. 6 more months and I'm sure it would have looked like the one in the picture.
Moral of the story: there are good and bad products in all price categories and no, not every single product design is foolproof. No matter how universal and genericized the category it's in is, as innovation sometimes also breaks stuff.
Bad stuff's also on the market.