I guess as a broader question, how does wireless power transfer work in general and how are we able to transfer it from space, as I saw an article on it a while back.
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Surprisingly, the same way charging it with a cable does!
Inside the wall adapter there are two coils. One is at your 110V or 220V mains voltage. When two coils are in close proximity, power transfers between them, and it’s set up so that the other coil gets 5V or whatever happens to be needed. This is a huge simplification of course, but this is ELI5.
But the thing is, both coils don’t touch and aren’t connected to each other. All chargers are technically wireless. It’s just that some are a bit further apart and split in both pieces. Normally both coils are inside a single device. For a wireless charger half is in the charger, and the other coil is in the phone.
As for how that works, magnets. One coil turns electricity into a magnetic field, and the other picks up the magnetic field and makes it back into electrical current.
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