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The short answer is no. USB-C is the standard that defines the physical “oval” reversible USB-C plug and connector and nothing more. It doesn’t refer to the underlying transfer protocols such as how fast data is transferred. A USB-C connector can be a very slow 480Mbps “USB 2.0” or it can be the fastest 40Gbps USB4 or Thunderbolt 4.USB PD, or USB Power Delivery, refers to the advanced charging capabilities over a USB-C a connector and cable. The newest USB Power Delivery 3.1 spec allows for charging up to an impressive 240 watts.

Obviously, one answer is the cable is simply bad or damaged, but if you’re finding that a brand-new cable that came with your $5 USB fan or $7 LED USB-trinket won’t transfer data at all, you're probably using the “free” USB-A to -C cable that came with that cheap device.Many of these cheap cables contain wires that only supply power to charge that cheap trinket and don’t support data transfer at all. You can sometimes see this by looking into the square USB-A cable connector where only two connections are visible. A standard USB-A cable usually features at least four connections inside of it.Y

USB-C is the standard for charging phones, tablets, and laptops, and is rapidly becoming the standard for even cheap $5 USB fans and other electronic trinkets.While there can be many reasons why your device won’t charge -- such as a bad cable or bad charger -- the most common reason no-name USB hardware won’t charge when using a USB-C to -C cable, but will charge using a USB-A to -C cable is likely the fault of a poorly designed device.Charging from USB-C is complex and requires devices to negotiate charge rates before the USB-C Power Delivery charger will supply any power. Many cheap USB-C de