EBL Lithium-Ion AA & AAA Batteries Any Good? Find Out!

Are the popular EBL lithium-Ion (Li-ion) AA & AAA batteries sold on Amazon any good? Find out in this highly informative battery capacity testing video! Everything to know about these 1.5V AA & AAA rechargeable lithium-ion batteries, and they'll be put to the test so you'll know if they're worth buying. Enjoy the video!

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[electronicsNmore]

Like to see another battery or product tested? If so, leave a comment below. Thank you!

[ProjectFarm]

Thank you very much for the terrific review on these! I really like the 1.5 volts!

[ivos]

Came from Project Farm, wasn't disappointed. Good work guys.

[waltschannel]

Amazing review. One, I didn't know these existed. Two, you provided a ton of technical details about how they are designed. It's crazy that they have to have a regulator to drop the voltage to an acceptable level. But that's how lithium batteries are. I'm in!

[Jarrow]

The biggest issue with the AA and AAA rechargeable lithiums are the fact that the technology for the AA and AAA's are not refined to a point where I would consider it acceptable. Many issues as most of the Lithium rechargeable batts in AA and AAA are from sources I find dodgy to say the least. When companies like Energizer, Panasonic and Nitecore start producing rechargeable litium AA and AAA's, I would be more comfortable with the concept. The AA and AAA NIMH batts are fine for primitive devices that functions adequately with lower voltages. High tech devices that need high voltage is another issue and unfortunately Alkaline and non rechargeable Lithium AA and AAA's you will just have to settle for now. But we'll get there eventually when the big battery brands have figured out all the quirks and start producing them.

[extremelydave]

Yet another awesome video with tons of REAL world info, not marketing B.S. If you have the time, it would be interesting to see how Eneloop lithium batteries stack up since they are quite popular. Thanks for taking the time to do this video!!!!

[mfx]

It's usually higher current devices with motors that say "alkaline only" and it's not due to the lower voltage but more that if there's a fault/short circuit or the motor stalls it could lead to dangerous currents being drawn from NiMH batteries whereas Alkalines will safely current limit.

[tarstarkusz]

So let's me get this straight. I need a special charger that costs more money to buy cells that cost more money that have the same exact capacity as a 2500mah (3wh) nimh cell ? All of the disadvantages of lithium ion without the advantages of lithium ion. Jeez. Where do I sign up?

[nixietee]

I bought JUGEE brand AAs for my wireless computer-mice, some time ago. The NiMh never worked properly and using normal AAs was a nuisance and started to get costly. They are holding up quite well and I'm quite happy with them. I always have one or two spares charged, in case of an empty battery.
The voltage drop to 1.2V at 11:05 is a 'feature' to trigger the low voltage indicator of the device. Else it would always show a full battery sign until it stops working.
Also I do not recommend the ones with integrated USB ports. The real estate of the port takes away from the Li-Io cell and those batteries usually have a lower capacity than the ones that come with a charger.

[Thohean]

I've been using the EBL and Tenergy brand 9v batteries to power 12v fans and they work way better than alkaline and Zinc batteries. I recently bought these same AA EBL batteries for a waterpik and they work well for that, too.

[methlalpallewatta]

Test for EMI around 1 MHz. The buck converter inside is emitting. Can't use with MW AM radios.

[marquisdemoo]

I use the EBL AA batteries for those devices which cannot otherwise use a rechargeables because the voltage is too low. In the UK I have been unable to get the AAA. I have however found 2 issues with these Lithium Batteries, firstly because the output voltage is constant until they die you get no indication of battery life. The second issue is that I have had the odd battery prematurely totally die, which in a series bank takes the whole bank out. With other rechargeables, they rarely fail totally and if one battery is low capacity the failure is more gradual.

[cekpi]

What about self discharge of these?
That's really the test i want to see. I've modified some of my devices with lipo cells because of their lower self discharge. NiMhs usually have higher self discharge (even LSD) than lithium based batteries in my experience.
If they have same or worse self discharge than NiMhs, they aren't worth it.

[JessicaFEREM]

I really like that these actually properly use the battery low mechanism built into devices instead of just staying at 1.2v and dropping below that (which is where some devices consider the battery dead). I might actually get these for the cases that I can't use a NiMh, sadly nimh hasn't been dethrowned since they're still leagues cheaper. I can buy like a 20 pack of nimh for a 4 pack of li-ion.

[brentjohnson]

Thanks for the video. Did you test the Lithium AA for RFI (radio frequency interference )? I have seen other Lithium-AA batteries generate noise making an AM radio unusable. I like the power or voltage, just disappointed in the RFI I am reading about. Thanks again for your review. Very good description of the theory without talking down to us. Well done! All the best from north Texas.

[Diviance]

I bought a set of 4 of these (a newer version, it appears) to use in my Sofabaton U1 remote. Rechargeable NiHM batteries would cause the remote to die within a day or two thanks to the voltage drop. Alkaline would work for a few weeks. These EBL ones last at least as long as the alkaline, usually longer.

Worth it.

[aspendell]

NiMh cells do not have self-discharge like the old NiCad cells did. I have many AA and AAA NiMh cells that last over 2 years in low draw devices like remotes and digital thermometers.
Further, NiMh cells have up to 3x the capacity of the cells you reviewed. I get up to 1900 mWh out of my AAAs. I could see a case for using these LiIon cells if they had 2 or 3X the capacity, to justify the custom charger and added cost. But I cant think of any reason in their current state. And I have the same OPUS charger you do that I test with.

[tarstarkusz]

This is $5 per cell. That's pretty steep. I have a lot of AA battery operated equipment and the only thing I have ever found that isn't crazy about nimh cells' lower voltage is a GP2X handheld game. It works fine right off the charger and for a couple hours of use afterwards, but after that, it tends to crash on boot up once a cell is past like 50% discharge. But this device draws like 500 ma and will not operate with alkaline batteries for very long.
NIMH low discharge batteries hold their charge for years.
These batteries would probably be good for the GP2X, but really nothing else. But this is a very special use case of a non-Western low volume device which really should have used a lithium battery. The current draw is just way too high.
 EEVBlogs did a couple of videos on a device called the batterizer and he checked a bunch of electronic devices designed to run on AA batteries and every single device he checked ran fine down to .9 volts per cell.

[bartnash]

I have a tac flashlight that uses three triple a batteries but I'm tired of buying new batteries every two weeks, what would you recommend for this application?

[budmartin]

Man! Thanks for another great video. I have been looking at these EBL batteries for a long time but never buy them yet since they are very expensive and require its own charger, I am so glad that you perform the test. I also wonder what the standby current of the built-in buck converter is and if it will drain the battery if the battery sits unused for a long time.