Hi, I was in need to replace my USB-A to lightning cable. With the gloom of everything switching to USB-C I was looking for some cheaper alternatives on Aliexpress.

To do my diligence I looked up all the brands on the official apple MFi page. I found a cable from a brand called “smartdevil”. Their product page contained the normal Aliexpress fuss like using two control chips or a nylon band.

It also contained claims I deemed as valid. Like offering USB 2.0 transfer speeds of 480Mps or a list of fast charging capable devices.

These claims made me pull the trigger and I ordered two 1m long cables around 3$ each. For the first time ever I received them in smartdevil branded bubble wrap bags and not those generic bags. Every cable was individual boxed, shrink warped and had a printed on 16 digit number behind an “uncover to check for authenticity” sticker. The QR code contained the url “ck.fw-12365.com”. Once I entered my 16 digit code to this page it confirmed a “genuine” product.

So far so good I thought. Unwrapping and unboxing the cables revealed that the lightning cable connector misses two pins on both sides. I started my research and found a 2y old reddit post. Comments reached from definitely not MFi or you won’t be able to transfer any data.

To concur these claims I took my old iPhone 8 plus out of the drawer and connected it to an original Apple 12W USB-A charger. I used the trollstore app “nice battery” to check charging speed and compared them to my original apple cable. They both showed the same speed of around 1400mA at time of testing.

Next I did some research on what the missing pins might do. According to TechInsights and nyansatan they are data pins. I plugged my phone into my computer expecting it to not show up but wrong again. The phone asked for permission to share data with my pc and showed up. I was able to transfer photos over to my pc like with the original apple cable.

I’m now somehow confused. What are this missing pins supposed to do? Did Apple just include them for future expansion of lightning? Do they serve another purpose like communication of accessories which I don’t need? Why would smartdevil put in the extra work with branded packaging and a verification website if they were fake? I hope someone can clear this up for me or can provide me with some thoughts.

If requested and I allowed by the mods I can share the aliexpress url but I don’t want this to be removed because of advertisement.

TL;DR bought a lightning cable of aliexpress from a brand contained in the MFi database. Two pins are missing on the connector side. Charging and data transfer works like on my original apple cable. My research gave me no answer what the missing pins do. Please help.