Blinking is the power to transport oneself to a thought-of location or person in the "blink of an eye". This is a warlock's way of teleportation.

Description

Blinking is an instantaneous transfer, usually accompanied by a short, sharp sound. However, it can also be accompanied by a quick whoosh. The movement is so fast that it may cause confusion to those around them.

According to Melinda Warren, her lover Matthew Tate copied his power of blinking from another witch. This explains that the power to blink was originally a power of witches, but after it was stolen by warlocks centuries ago, it started manifesting within them instead of witches, making it a warlock's power.^[1]

Prue, Piper, and Phoebe Halliwell gained this power after they were turned into warlocks under the influence of a marriage bond between Prue and a warlock named Zile. It is revealed that when warlocks want to find someone, they don't have to know where to go, but can simply focus on that person and blink there.^[2]

Weakness

Blinking is dependent on the eyes, which can be used as a weakness. It has been shown that bright lights can prevent a warlock from blinking.^[3] Additionally, the Charmed Ones created a potion to blind warlocks with a flash of light, preventing them from blinking as well. This temporarily leaves them open to attacks.^[4]

List of beings who use(d) Blinking

Original power

Through spell, power stealing, etc.

• Matthew Tate (Originally stolen from a witch)
• The Charmed Ones (When transformed into warlocks)
• Hogan (Obtains it later in an unknown way. Presumably, the resurrected Source increased his powers to the point where he could blink)

Gallery

The Blinking article has a Photo Gallery.

Notes and Trivia

• Blinking appears and occurs faster than any other form of teleportation.
• One of the Charmed novels describes how blinking feels for the user; it is described it as a feeling of being folded, actually quite slowly, folded over and over until one simply pops out of existence and appears somewhere else. However, as all novel content, this is not considered canon information.
• It is possible that blinking is a neutral power. In "The Witch is Back", Melinda says that Matthew must have copied the power from a witch. It could be however that being how early in the series that episode was, the writers hadn't yet figured out what powers belonged to whom.
• The Book of Shadows implies that only particularly powerful warlocks are able to blink. However, this contradicts the fact that some powerful warlocks from Season 1 (Rex Buckland, Hannah Webster, Greg and Paul Rowe) apparently couldn't (but this could be due to the fact already mentioned with the writers of the series). In addition, apparently weaker warlocks (such as Bacarra and the Familiar Hunter) were able to blink.
• Despite this power being triggered by the user blinking, the majority of times that it's used no blinking actually occurs.
• Two Rat Demons were shown to be able to blink.^[5]

References