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Solar + crank

Midland ER50

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Midland's modern answer to the crank radio

The Midland ER50 steps up from the entry-level crank-radio crowd: a NOAA weather alert radio with AM/FM, a big 2,600 mAh lithium-ion battery, solar and hand-crank charging, USB phone charging, and a Cree LED flashlight with SOS strobe. The family's grab-and-go emergency radio — rugged enough for a bug-out bag, capable enough to be the only radio in the kit.

Power you can actually lean on

The headline is the battery: a 3.7V, 2,600 mAh rechargeable Li-ion cell (an 18650, per Midland's support docs) with a claimed up to 25 hours of normal use per Midland. That's a real jump over the 1,000 mAh cells in budget crank radios — days of alert-watch duty with juice left to charge a phone. Charging comes three ways: micro-USB, hand crank, solar. Two honest caveats from Midland's own user guide: the radio can't receive alerts while charging an external device, and it doesn't support alkaline batteries at all — the internal cell is the only power store.

Flashlight first, radio always

Midland designed the ER50 as a visibility tool too: Cree LED flashlight with low/high brightness and an SOS strobe flashing the Morse distress pattern. The large backlit LCD shows clock and battery level even when powered off — a small but genuinely useful readiness check. Digital AM/FM tuning plus NOAA weather scan (auto-locking the strongest local signal) round out the receive side, in a 6 x 3 x 1.8-inch chassis per Midland.

Who it's for, and who should skip it

It fits families building a single grab-and-go kit radio: big battery, crank, solar, phone charging, and a real flashlight in one box. A good car-kit radio, where battery capacity matters most.

Skip it if you want pocket size — the Sangean DT-400W is a third of the bulk. Skip it for shortwave — the XHDATA D-808 or Tecsun PL-880 are the receiving machines. And if you want store-bought batteries, the DT-400W is the AA answer.

Pros

• Large 2,600 mAh rechargeable battery — up to 25 hours per Midland
• Solar, hand crank, and micro-USB charging options
• USB output charges a phone in an emergency
• Cree LED flashlight with low/high modes and SOS strobe
• NOAA weather scan auto-locks the strongest local signal

Cons

• No alkaline battery fallback — internal cell is the only power store
• Can't receive alerts while charging an external device (per Midland's guide)
• No S.A.M.E. county-code filtering listed
• AM/FM/weather only — no shortwave

Specs

Frequently asked questions

Can the ER50 replace my portable power bank? Not exactly. The USB output is an emergency phone top-up, and the radio pauses alert monitoring while charging a device. Fully charge the radio before using it to charge others, per Midland's guidance.

Why no alkaline batteries? Midland built the ER50 around the high-capacity Li-ion cell; the bay doesn't accept alkalines. The trade-off is capacity versus the grab-any-battery flexibility of AA radios.

How does weather scan work? In weather mode the radio scans the NOAA channels and locks onto the strongest local signal — the clearest warning broadcast without manually hunting for your area's frequency.

Verdict

Midland's serious take on the emergency radio: a genuinely large battery, triple charging, phone top-ups, and a proper Cree flashlight. Mind the alkaline limitation and the alert-while-charging quirk, and it's a strong single-radio kit. Check the current price on Amazon: View on Amazon

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