The 10 Best Cordless Soldering Irons

Editor's Notes

August 23, 2020:

I’ve removed a couple of the butane tanks like the A-One Gas Torch as well as the All Splendid Mini which had functioning issues. Butane portable irons tend to have more power and larger tanks, and the torch in the Lexivon Butane Kit that I’ve just added is on the higher end of this scale with a maximum operating temperature of 2400 Fahrenheit as a torch - that is to say, without a soldering tip attached - and what I believe is 125 watts of power. Besides, the most common solder alloys found on electrical equipment and PCB’s should melt below 400 Fahrenheit, or 200 Celsius.

While power is understandably the coveted metric that many novices use to compare the quality of solder irons half the time, it doesn’t tell you the full story, and you can get a model with a lot of power that doesn’t necessarily transfer that heat well, so do your homework. With that in mind, the other model I’ve introduced as a replacement to the struggling Tooluxe Battery Powered, the UY Chan TS80P, is just great at channeling that power into thermal heat, which is probably evidenced by how quickly it heats up.

The model is actually made by a company called MiniWare – you can see their logo on the box - but is redistributed by multiple other brands. The TS80, along with its predecessor, the TS100, are favorites among many electronics solderers, as is the Hakko FX-901. The TS80P is the second generation of the TS80, which adds features like QuickCharge (QC3.0) as well as about 10W more power.

Another really impressive and innovative feature of the TS80 – and by extension, the TS80P - is its tip-replacement mechanism, which can really make changing tips easy - the tips are actually slotted into the body via a headphone jack. The model isn’t cordless in the very strictest sense of the word, but it is portable, and not like a traditional solder iron, so you can hook it up to a small 9-V lithium power bank and carry it around.

During our last update, the previous editor removed a model called the Dremel 2000-01, because of an issue of not being able to find replacement tips on the market, despite it being an otherwise excellent model. I wanted to reintroduce it during this update, but unfortunately couldn’t because, after checking again, Dremel still isn’t making tips, and it looks like they may have even gone out of business.

February 05, 2019:

Took a look at both battery powered and butane options, selecting the Hakko FX-901 and Portasol P-1 Professional as top choices, respectively. Both offer ease of use and greater durability than many. Also added several less expensive options for the casual hobbyist, including the All Splendid Mini and Tooluxe Battery Powered. We ultimately decided to omit the Dremel 2000-01, as it's difficult to find replacement tips for it, and the Weller BL60MP, which has a couple of design quirks that undercut its safety.