Anker SOLIX F3800 Portable Power Station with 2× 200W Solar Panels, 3,840Wh LiFePO4 Battery, 120V/240V 6,000W AC Output, Solar Generator for Home Use, RVs, Emergencies, Outages, and Outdoor Camping

I purchased an Anker Solix F3800 in March of 2024 with the intention of using it as I develop my property in Idaho. It has proven to be an invaluable tool, and as I've used it in various scenarios, I've learned a lot about its quirks and undocumented "features".I use the F3800 to power my tools and recharge batteries, to provide light where I'm working, run my well pump and more recently to provide power to my 40ft. Class A diesel pusher motorhome. It's been quite reliable, but it does have a few issues.First, should you purchase one, be sure to hook it up to wifi and update the firmware. Prior to doing that, I was unable to use AC power (from my RV Generator) along with solar to recharge it. I'm currently running firmware 2.1.5, which does allow simultaneous AC and DC charging.Second, the MPPT controllers built in for solar are optimized for Anker's proprietary solar solutions, which are relatively expensive. Pay close attention to how you configure your solar panel wiring to optimize charging. Assuming you can find the right combination of serial/parallel connections, you can charge the F3800 with up to 2400 watts of solar power, but it's not easy to get to that number.Third, the built-in BMS limits charging current when the batteries are colder than 10c/50f. I've discovered that you won't be able to put more than about 710 watts DC or 685 watts AC into the F3800 if the battery temp reads below these figures. (Quick tip - put a heavy AC load on it to get those electrons flowing and warm up the batteries in the morning!)IF the batteries are above 10c, it will charge quickly with solar or AC input. I manage to push about 1500 - 1600 watts into it at peak sunlight with my two strings of panels, and at that rate it only takes a few hours. If you're charging a warm unit with AC power, it will charge completely in under two hours, assuming you have not limited the AC power for charging via the app.Overall I'm very pleased. the phone app (I use IOS) is good, but could be improved by adding input and output power over time. It has graphs, but since those numbers are constantly changing, there's no way to track usage.Overall, I'm very pleased with my purchase. Anker support is responsive, although it took almost a week of emails back and forth to find out that my "charging problem" was because the batteries were cold and current was being limited by the BMS. For those of us who understand solar, batteries, BMS, etc. 50 degrees F is a pretty high threshold under which to limit current. Hopefully Anker will reduce that to a more reasonable level in a future firmware update. With such a high temp. hurdle the usefulness of this device will be less than desired as the cold weather approaches.For those wondering, it *does* allow you to use a plug-in EV charger to charge your EV. I've tried it on my Rivian R1T, although the capacity of the Anker is a drop in the bucket for an EV with a 131kW battery!Highly recommended due to typical Anker quality, flexibility of use and expansion capabilities. It offers a reasonable value proposition when purchased on sale or in bundles.

Anker is a great Company that truly cares about their customers and stands behind their products.

I have a 13kw generator but with this last hurricane, I could not get outside to set it up for over 4 hours. We had to throw out some food in the refrigerator. I decided to bite the bullet and try a battery backup system. I liked the Anker Solix because it provided a 50amp and a 30amp 240v outlets, where others you had to combine 2 units to get 30amp 240v. I received this two weeks ago but finally got to run a test on this unit today, which is the F3800 plus one battery pack. I have a 30amp receptacle wired into the panel, which is what I used to plug my generator into. Mine is a manual switchover whee I have to turn the main breaker off first, connect the generator and then turn the 30amp breaker on to provide power to the home. Instead of plugging in the generator, I plugged in the Anker F3800 using the 30amp outlet. My home is 1800sf, gas heat and cooktop and a 3 ton A/C unit. It ran all of this fine except for a little light flicker when the A/C kicked on. Will probably order a softstart to reduce the initial amp draw. I am thinking of installing an automatic transfer switch and leaving the Anker F3800 plugged into it so I can have immediate power without having to go through the manual process of switching power.I tested the unit for a little over 3 hours, letting the A/C start and stop multiple times. I started out with a total of about 10 hours of run time with just the lights, TV and refrigerator on, pulling between 650-700 watts of power. When the A/C kicked on, it showed about 2 1/2 hours of run time as it was pulling about 3900w. Once the A/C turned off, it adjusted back to 9 hours. After 3 1/2 hours of testing, it showed I still had 8 hours of run time with just the lights, TV and refrigerator running.I know this will not carry me through a hurricane where we lose power for days or weeks but when the battery power is used up, I can start my generator, run the house and recharge this unit. May look at solar panels in the future. Over all, even though it is expensive, it is doing what I want it to do.For those reviews that said the fans are extremely noisy, I did not experience that so they may have fixed it with a software upgrade.

I wish I had not bought this. I bought this on recommendation of a friend. Amazon/Anker do not allow returns. The product was shipped without a User Manual. I had to print it from the Amazon website. The User Manual is terribly written and even with a degree in electrical engineering it was not very intuitive. Small text, very hard to read even with reading glasses, had to use a magnifying glass. The system ships with a pile of 7 cables with no labels of any kind on them. The directions for recharging only show a picture of a cable, very small, and show plugging into a wall socket and the three prong connector on the side. There is no label saying this side is the charging ports or these are the output sockets. The diagram of the solar panel connection shows 3 panels, there are no directions for using a single panel. You have to figure out the single panel cable and connections yourself.The charge rate for their 400W panel was only 145W in our backyard in full sun. So for 3840 watts I would estimate that as a 26 hour charge time... pretty useless even in summer. You will run to zero charge way faster than it recharges.Edited to add, when a slight hazey cloud appeared the charge rate dropped to 22W. Pulled it inside to charge on 110VAC.Also this unit is very heavy. If you are older or not strong it is very difficult to take outside if you don't have an exit without steps. I used to be very strong, 245lb bench and 120lb curl sets when I weighed 145lbs. It was difficult for me to lift 1 step of 10 inches from our patio into the house. They should have optional 25ft cables so the unit can stay in the house when using the solar panel, which is still useless.Do your own research and choose another brand.