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The Problem with these Smartphone Batteries

| 5 products mentioned
Marques Brownlee Marques Brownlee host
Watch on YouTube battery technology smartphone hardware silicon carbon batteries product safety engineering trade-offs market competition battery longevity

Marques Brownlee investigates why major smartphone manufacturers like Apple, Samsung, and Google are avoiding silicon carbon batteries despite their superior energy density, despite competitors like Xiaomi and Honor already deploying them at scale. The core issue isn't supply constraints but rather serious concerns about battery swelling and longevity that haven't been adequately tested in real-world conditions over extended periods.

Key takeaways
  • • Silicon carbon batteries enable significantly higher energy density by replacing graphite with silicon, allowing phones like the Honor Power 2 to pack 10,000 mAh in the same footprint as an iPhone 17 Pro Max's 5,000 mAh battery.
  • • Silicon expands up to three times its original volume when absorbing lithium ions during charging, creating mechanical stress that can cause internal cracking and potentially catastrophic thermal runaway if not properly managed.
  • • Despite thorough testing showing error rates below one in 250,000, major manufacturers worry this still translates to dozens of failures at Apple or Samsung's scale, potentially repeating the Galaxy Note 7 disaster of 2016.
  • • Real-world battery degradation is harder to predict than lab testing because batteries face temperature fluctuations, humidity changes, pressure variations, and physical drops that standard charge-cycle testing doesn't fully capture.
  • • American tech companies have less incentive to adopt riskier battery tech because the US market prioritizes software ecosystem lock-in over hardware features, whereas global markets with more hardware competition are driving silicon carbon adoption.
  • • Silicon carbon batteries remain a bleeding-edge technology as of 2026, and major manufacturers are waiting for more long-term real-world data before committing production capacity.

Mentioned (5)

Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge
Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge "like enabling the ultra thin ones like Galaxy S25 Edge and iPhone Air because they could be super..." ▶ 0:41
iPhone 17 Pro Max
iPhone 17 Pro Max "So, this is an iPhone 17 Pro Max. It has about a 5,000 mAh battery" ▶ 0:02
Honor Power 2 "but this is the Honor Power 2. Yes, it's absolutely a clone of the iPhone, but it's also thinner ..." ▶ 0:08
iPhone Air
iPhone Air "like enabling the ultra thin ones like Galaxy S25 Edge and iPhone Air because they could be super..." ▶ 0:44
OnePlus flagship
OnePlus flagship "I remember when the new OnePlus flagship came out last January, and it made this huge jump from 5..." ▶ 1:39

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