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I took apart a 9,000,000mAh power bank from eBay to learn the truth - here's what's inside

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Bold claims! Adrian Kingsley-Hughes/ZDNET

A power bank boasting a massive capacity of 9 million milliamp hours (mAh) that fits in the palm of your hand, all for just a little over $10, sounds too good to be true, doesn't it? Well, you know what they say.

A reader brought this listing to my attention, questioning the validity of such bold claims. Although I harbored significant doubts, I decided to investigate further. All in the name of science, of course.

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First, let's put that claim of 9 million mAh into perspective. The $150 Anker PowerCore 24K has a capacity of 24,000 mAh, and it's quite a sizable power bank, weighing in at 1.3 pounds. To achieve a capacity of 9 million mAh, I'd need to spend over $35,000 on 375 PowerCore 24K power banks, and that's certainly not something I'd want to carry around—nor would it fit in the palm of my hand.

So, I ordered one of these purportedly massive-capacity power banks and waited a few days for delivery.

Here's what I received:

This definitely doesn't look like a 9,000,000 mAh power bank. Adrian Kingsley-Hughes/ZDNET

Surprisingly, the packaging lacked any bold claims about the promised, yet unrealistic, capacity. Additionally, the plethora of typos on the package didn't inspire confidence in the product.

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