A wireless power transmitter can include an inverter that receives a DC input voltage and generates an AC output voltage; a wireless power transmitter coil that receives the AC output voltage and magnetically couples to a wireless power receiving coil of a wireless power receiver to facilitate wireless power transfer; and inverter controller circuitry that monitors a plurality of switching events of at least one of first and second complementary switching devices of the inverter, stores an indication whether a dead time associated with the monitored plurality of switching events permitted optimal switching for each monitored switching event, and adaptively controls a dead time between turn off of the first switching device and turn on of the second switching device responsive to the stored indications. The inverter controller circuitry that monitors a plurality of switching events of at least one of the first and second switching devices can include a sample and hold circuit that samples an output voltage of the inverter and a comparator that compares the sampled output voltage to one of a high reference voltage corresponding to a high inverter rail voltage and a low reference voltage corresponding to a low inverter rail voltage. The control circuitry can adaptively control the dead time responsive to the stored indications by decreasing the dead time responsive to one or more indications that the dead time is too long and/or increasing the dead time responsive to one or more indications that the dead time is too short. One or more indications that the dead time is too long can be a majority of the stored indications, a supermajority of the stored indications, or a selected number of sequential indications that the dead time is too long. One or more indications that the dead time is too short can be a majority of the stored indications, a supermajority of the stored indications, or a selected number of sequential indications that the dead time is too short.