The Best Way To Pack Your Chargers To Avoid Tangling

The worst pasta in the world is not something you can buy from a restaurant. Instead, you can find it on your workspace, nightstand, or everyday bag. Yup, we're talking about wire spaghetti, the kind that takes forever to untangle. If you own three or more mobile devices, you may already be far too familiar with your cables and dongles intertwining, making a rat's nest a hassle to unfurl. And it's not like you can throw them away, especially if you're traveling and want to stay connected.

Packing your belongings and making sure that they fit in those rock-hard, titanium boxes you call luggage is hard enough as it is. Organizing smaller items like wires and chargers may be even tougher because of their propensity to create a jumbled mess. You can't just throw them in your bag or slip them in random nooks because the TSA notes that while you're free to pack them when you fly, you're expected to keep them organized in the event of secondary screening.

So, how do you organize your chargers, you ask? For starters, you can pare them down to what you'll surely be using during the trip.

Every mobile device usually has a corresponding charging block and cable. And so if you own a smartphone, a tablet, a laptop, a smartwatch, and a pair of wireless earphones, you automatically have ten different contraptions just to keep all of them charged. Having that many may be fine if they're only confined to your work desk, but when you're traveling, it's challenging to haul all of them around and account for each one.

If you have devices from the same manufacturer, you can likely use a common cable and-or charging block, so you may want to leave the rest behind to streamline your on-the-go charging setup. After all, unless you're going on a work trip, your vacation doesn't demand round-the-clock connectivity, so you can probably forego some of your chargers and stick to one. If you can help it, you may even want to leave some of those devices at home and only bring what you need.

If you're adamant about bringing most of your gadgets, you can dodge wire spaghetti by using a charging station that can simultaneously top up your devices. These hubs have multiple built-in ports and function as a central hub for your charging needs, and some even have wireless charging capabilities so you can do away with wires completely. Just make sure that your charging station of choice is compatible with your devices.

Charging hubs, especially the high-quality ones, cost a pretty penny, so it's understandable that you don't want to fork over a lot for them. In that case, you can unleash your Marie Kondo skills and make use of organizers, wraps, and pouches to keep your chargers organized. There are tons of organizers specifically for electronic devices and their respective chargers, so just pick one with enough pockets and loops to accommodate your tech collection.

Want to stretch your budget even further? Another option is to get resourceful. If you don't have extra pouches lying around and don't want to buy a new one, you can get creative and use hair ties for coiling your cables or even binder clips for keeping wires together. Old tin cans and eyeglass cases also make great receptacles for small accessories like chargers, earbuds, and SD cards, so don't hesitate to use them as stand-in storage units.