Recently, many companies have announced the production schedule of solid-state batteries or technological progress. The concept of solid-state battery has also continued to rise in popularity in the capital market. As the most promising "next generation power battery", what is the current development status of solid-state batteries? How far is it to be true mass production?

  National ministries and commissions and local governments have recently intensively introduced policies to encourage solid-state batteries. In February this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and eight other departments issued the "Action Plan for High-Quality Development of New Energy Storage Manufacturing", which clearly supported the development of solid-state batteries for energy storage, and proposed to accelerate the research and development of long-life and high-safe solid-state batteries, and promote the solid-state development of lithium batteries and sodium batteries. The "Key Points of Industrial and Information Technology Standards Work in 2025" issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in April proposed to establish an all-solid-state battery standard system to accelerate its industrialization process. Beijing, Shanghai and other places have included solid-state batteries in local industrial plans, highlighting their application potential in new energy vehicles, energy storage, consumer electronics, low-altitude economy and other fields.

  The global competitive landscape is undercurrent, and foreign companies rely on deep technological accumulation to actively promote the commercial application of solid-state batteries. Toyota, Japan, plans to achieve full-solid-state battery loading test in 2027 and mass production after 2030; South Korea's Samsung SDI is expected to start mass production in 2027; many startups in the United States focus on breakthrough improvements in core performance such as energy density, charging and discharging speed, and accelerate the layout of technology patents and mass production process verification.

  Solid-state batteries have triggered a new round of global competition in dimensions such as material research and development, patent layout and industrial standards, and have become a key technological commanding height for reconstructing the new energy industry structure. However, large-scale mass production still faces technical, cost and industrial chain challenges: First, most positive and negative electrode materials will experience volume expansion and contraction during the deliquification process, which may cause the interface separation between the solid electrode and the electrolyte, resulting in a decrease in battery life. Second, the material cost of all-solid-state batteries is as high as 2 yuan/watt-hour, which is 3 to 5 times that of conventional liquid lithium-ion batteries. Third, key materials such as solid electrolytes and lithium metal negative electrodes have not yet been supplied on a large scale, and some technical patent barriers have restricted industrial development.

  To this end, most domestic companies choose semi-solid battery technology as a transition, and the semi-solid battery production lines of CATL, Honeycomb Energy, Guansheng Co., Ltd. and other companies have been put into production one after another. For a considerable period of time in the future, the power battery market will present a "three-legged" pattern of conventional liquid, semi-solid and all-solid batteries.

  It is expected that by 2027, semi-solid-state batteries will be commercially applied in the field of high-end electric vehicles. All-solid-state batteries are in the stage of technological breakthroughs and small-scale on-board verification. They will be used in small batches in subdivided scenarios such as eVTOL and robots in the early stage. By 2027, all-solid-state batteries are expected to begin mass loading, and in the early stage they are mostly used in areas with high performance and safety requirements such as high-end electric vehicles, aerospace, and home energy storage. With the expansion of application scale and the decline in costs, all-solid-state batteries are expected to usher in an inflection point in industrialization around 2030, and their market penetration rate is expected to grow rapidly since then.

  The next five years will not only be a critical period for breakthroughs in solid-state battery technology, but also a period of strategic integration of the industrial chain ecosystem. The industry needs to drive industrial upgrading with technological breakthroughs, promote cost reduction through industrial chain integration, drive market demand with innovation in application scenarios, build a standardized industry ecosystem with standardized systems, activate innovation momentum with financial capital, and form a "five-in-one" collaborative development system.

  First, strengthen core technology research and development, promote the application of AI and large models in the field of solid-state battery research and development, accelerate material screening, simulate lithium dendrites suppression strategies, and shorten the research and development cycle of technical links such as solid electrolyte materials, solid-solid interface optimization, and lithium metal negative electrodes.

  The second is to improve the supporting facilities of the industrial chain, encourage car companies and battery companies to jointly build joint laboratories, and promote the vertical integration of "materials-battery-cell-systems". Support will be provided for the localization of core equipment such as solid electrolyte coating machines.

  The third is to expand application scenarios, launch the "listing and leadership" demonstration in the fields of new energy vehicles, power grid energy storage, aerospace, etc., give priority to the procurement of solid-state battery products, explore emerging markets such as eVTOL and humanoid robots, and dilute costs through large-scale applications.

  Fourth, build standards and recycling systems, accelerate the formulation of certification standards for the performance, safety and cycle life of all-solid-state batteries, lay out solid-state battery recycling technology in advance, and establish a closed-loop utilization network for key materials.

  Fifth, establish a financial support chain of "basic research-engineering-commercial applications", establish a special fund for the research and development of key materials and device integration of solid-state batteries, increase financial support for start-ups, and improve the risk compensation mechanism for solid-state batteries from technology development to commercial applications.

  (The author Liu Jian is the deputy director of the Energy System Analysis Center of the Energy Institute of the China Institute of Macroeconomics)

[Editor in charge: Ran Xiaoning]