ALLPOWERS R2500 Expandable Portable Power Station: A Full Review

Living in an area with aging grid infrastructure means losing power every time the wind blows a little too hard. For a long time, I tried to get by with cheap battery banks. Friends constantly ask me for recommendations on the best power station under $100, and I always have to break the bad news. At that price, you're buying a glorified phone charger that will maybe keep a small desk fan running for an hour. If you want to keep your fridge cold and your internet router on during a real blackout, you have to step up to something with serious capacity. That's why I ended up looking at the ALLPOWERS R2500. It packs a 1920Wh LiFePO4 battery and pushes out 2500W, which is enough to run kitchen appliances or a space heater without the inverter shutting down. The fact that you can expand it up to 20kWh later with extra batteries is a big deal for off-grid setups, though out of the box, the base unit takes up a fair bit of space. At around $860, it's a significant investment, but the new shopper discount going around makes the math a lot easier to swallow. It charges incredibly fast from a standard wall outlet, and the solar input handles enough wattage to actually recharge it during daylight hours if the grid stays down for days. Just be prepared to lift a nearly 65-pound box when it arrives.