On Our Desk - 18

Messless Charge Station

Manufacturer: Messless
UK Price (as reviewed): £79.99 (Incl. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed): TBC

The Messless charge station is a very simple product, seeking to centralise all your mobile device charging needs into one single location and removing the need to have a half dozen cables traipsing from your power socket.

Interestingly though, rather than approaching the task with gusto and having a billion different connections and pull-out wires, the Messless has an interchangeable system of plugs and sockets that limit you to having four devices on charge at once, albeit stylishly.

The Messless itself is made of several different bits, the most central of which is the actual charging hub. The base of the hub is smaller than the top, creating a mushroom-esque shape that has a diameter of 12.5cm on the base and 20cm on the transparent top.


Despite the stylish…um, stylings of the Messless Charging Station though there’s really nothing hugely special with how the Messless works. The bottom of the charging hub attaches to a power-brick via a break-away cable (which is always appreciated when you’re as clumsy as we are), which in turn is powered by a standard kettle lead.

Power is thus provided to an array of different connectors which plug into the charging hub via USB. The top of the hub is spring-loaded too, so you can push it down when you need to yank a charger out and then pop it back up when it’s in use so that your devices rest flush with the top. It’s a clever and simple idea which means that, not only can you swap the ports over easily, but the capabilities of the Messless can be easily expanded, in theory at least.

The Messless comes with a fairly comprehensive range of connectors too – including ones for a PSP, iPhone or iPod Touch, Nokia and Sony Ericsson phones, a mini-USB connection and more. You can get a full list of connectors over on the (totally awful) official Messless site, but it’s a fair bet that the above mentioned connectors will cover most bases.


In fact, in terms of functionality the only thing that’s really missing from the Messless is the ability to hook it up to a PC in some way, which would be helpful for anyone wanting to charge iPhones or digital cameras as those things will just get plugged into a PC anyway (and can charge there). Still, it’s by no means a critical flaw in the system and, just like the haphazard way that you’ll end up collecting different devices on the surface of the hub, it’s little more than a slight annoyance.

What is a critical flaw for the Messless Charging Station though is the price – which is exorbitant to say the least when you consider that you already have the ability to charge your devices without it. What the Messless does is just make that a more stylish affair, which is well and good – but is it worth paying £80 for the fancy equivalent of a cable tidy?

Maybe, if you regularly have to charge a number of devices at the same time and want to have a handy dock for them all then the Messless is worth the cost – but we suspect that most other people can think of a better way to spend £80. Perhaps on a new mobile phone or digital camera?

Verdict: Not strictly a case of form of function, the Messless is still a case of style over sense. It does the job well enough, but is it worth paying £80 just to have all chargeable focused in one place? Frankly, there are better things to waste the money on.