Proporta Bamboo Apple Watch and iPhone Charging Stand review

For all the care and attention Apple put into creating the Apple Watch, the same can’t be said of its rather basic wireless charging cable. Yes, it magnetically holds the watch in place to ensure it stays connected, but it merely sits on your desk, rather than displaying it proudly. It makes the new nightstand mode all but redundant, as you can’t see it from bed when the screen is facing the ceiling. Proporta’s Bamboo charging stand aims to fix that, giving you somewhere to dock your Apple Watch and an accompanying iPhone.

The lacquered wooden stand is fairly compact, with cutouts for an iPhone and milled holes to run an Apple Watch charging cable and Lightning cable into. The cables thread in through the back of the dock and push up through pre-cut holes. The wood is finished nicely, with rounded edges and sanded surfaces that feel smooth to the touch. Four rubberised feet keep the dock rooted in place, ensuring cable tension won’t pull it off a desk or bedside table.

The phone dock has room for an iPhone 6s or an iPhone 6s Plus, and is deep enough that it won’t topple back under its own weight. Annoyingly the stand still orients the watch upwards, so you can’t see the screen when you’re in bed, but the open end means you don’t have to worry about unclasping the band if you have one of the more expensive metal straps. More frustrating is the fact that there’s no way to lock the Lightning cable in place – it often fell into the dock and had to be fished out before we could put our iPhone back on charge. 

It doesn’t appear to take cable length into account, eiother. The Apple Watch charging cable is significantly longer than the standard Apple Lightning cable, and so had plenty of slack when plugged into a multi-socket cable extension and placed on a bedside table. The Lightning cable was nearly taut, forcing the dock to be placed right at the back of the cabinet. This is admittedly only an issue if your plug sockets are far away from where you want to place the dock, but it’s worth keeping in mind.

It’s hardly a hassle to remove the Apple Watch charging cable when you need to take it with you on the move, but it’s so small and lightweight that it’s just as easy to take the whole dock with you. 

At £20 the Bamboo Apple Watch and iPhone Charging Stand isn’t exactly expensive, and while it would be better if there was some way to lock a lightning cable in place, it’s a fairly elegant way to charge and display your iPhone and Apple Watch. If the watch faced forwards rather than upwards it would be the best value nightstand dock around, but as it is it’s merely functional. Still, you’ll have to spend a lot more to get anything significantly better.