The study investigated the aging behavior of battery cells under realistic vehicle load profiles and compared it to aging under constant laboratory cycling—while maintaining identical average discharge power and charging behavior. The results show that constant cycling leads to significantly stronger degradation, particularly in terms of increased loss of lithium inventory (LLI) and inhomogeneities at the negative electrode. Over a 15-month relaxation period, the cells showed near-complete recovery—highlighting the limited relevance of conventional aging tests for real-world applications such as in the automotive sector, and underscoring the need for new testing strategies.
Apparent vs. true battery aging: Impact of various load characteristics on accelerated aging tests / Markus Schreiber, Yilei Lin, Alessandro Sommer, Nikolaos Wassiliadis, Pablo Morales Torricos, Marcel Rogge, Meinert Lewerenz, Cristina Grosu, Christian Endisch, Andreas Jossen, Markus Lienkamp / Journal of Energy Storage, 2025, 127, 116924 – DOI