One of the best cases and accessories you can own for any smartphone is an external battery. These days, our portable devices are always connected to WiFi or cellular data, constantly pinging us with life-interrupting notifications, and that can drain your battery really fast. Thankfully, companies like Mophie are here to help with their line of Juice Pack external battery cases. For the last few weeks, I’ve had the opportunity to test Mophie’s newest iPhone case, the Juice Pack Air for the iPhone 5, and I have to say I’ve come away quite impressed.

Let’s start with the hardware before we get to the juicy stuff (get it? Sorry, bad pun.) Typically I’m not a fan of smartphone cases, especially big, bulky ones, so you can understand my hesitance to strap a large external battery case to my iPhone 5. Thankfully, as its name implies, the Juice Pack Air manages to pack a 1,700 mAh into a relatively svelt casing that measures 0.63 inches thick - that’s just a little more than double the iPhone 5′s 0.30 inch thickness. It’s definitely a thick case, but it doesn’t feel as bulky as I had imagined, thanks mostly to the tapered back and smooth edges. Despite it’s thickness and the built-in battery, the Juice Pack Air only weighs 2.6 ounces, which actually adds a nice bit of heft to the shockingly light iPhone 5.

The case splits into two parts so you can slide your iPhone 5 inside. The bottom portion features a Lightning connector in the bottom, as well as an opening for the headphone jack (the case includes an extended 3.5mm adapter), and a microUSB passthrough. When your iPhone 5 is inside the Mophie, you can actually charge both the iPhone and the Juice Pack at the same time with a microUSB cable (syncing, however, will require you to remove the case and use a Lightning cable).

Other than that this is a fairly non-descript black case. Around back you’ll find an on/off switch next to a set of LED indicators that display remaining charge. Mophie has designed the sides of the case to match the iPhone 5, including smooth black volume keys and a physical mute switch on the left, and a sleep/wake button up top. One of the best hardware features of the Juice Pack Air is the front-facing speaker grills, which amplify and pump sound from the iPhone 5 out the front of the device toward the user. This is great, as it means no more accidentally covering the bottom-facing speaker on the iPhone 5 with your finger. The Juice Pack Air is certainly a well-designed case. It’s got a clean, simple look, offers great protection for the back and sides of your device, and feels great in-hand.

Finally we arrive at the Mophie’s true purpose. The Juice Pack Air is an external battery case, and as I mentioned above packs a 1,700mAh battery to provide your iPhone 5 with a little extra juice throughout the day. Mophie claims the Air will “double your battery life”, which in theory should be true: the iPhone 5 battery measures 1,440mAh according to GSMArena, so 1,700mAh should be enough for a full charge. In practice, I found that the fully-charged Juice Pack would give my iPhone 5 a 60% - 70% charge. Of course this will vary, and to be fair I was usually using my iPhone while the Mophie was charging it. If you put your iPhone into the Juice Pack and leave it alone, I suspect it would go much further, perhaps even to a full 100% charge. However, seeing as a case such as this is meant to give you more time to actually use your device, an extra 60% - 70% charge is a more likely expectation.

That’s the Juice Pack Air: a simple, nicely designed case that’ll keep your iPhone 5 chugging along for those last few hours of the day. I loved having this case around, especially when my iPhone was running low on-the-go. It’s easy to switch your phone into the Juice Pack, and provides some peace of mind knowing that a spare battery is always within reach. If you’re in the market for an iPhone 5 battery case, Mophie is one of the best names in the business, and you can’t go wrong with the Juice Pack Air. The Mophie Juice Pack Air is now available to order for $99.95, and comes in black, white, or PRODUCT(RED).

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