Panasonic Eneloop Batteries [REVIEW]

Eneloop Batteries Featured

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Rechargeable batteries can be a life saver and money saver, but at times when you need them most they never seem to have any charge left, so you find yourself having to recharge them often which can take hours on end. This all changes with the Eneloop batteries, which first came into play in 2005 by a company called Sanyo. They’re now branded under Panasonic and are in their fourth generation, lets see how they perform.

The Eneloop batteries come in three different varieties: the Eneloop standard model, “Eneloop Pro” high-end model, and “Eneloop Lite” being the entry model. The materials used to manufacture these batteries, in particular the positive electrodes, means that the standard model can be recharged up to a huge  2,100 times.

Advantages of Eneloop

All batteries will self-discharge but Eneloop do this at a much slower rate than your average battery. This means that the pre-charged batteries can be used straight away when purchased, but even after 5 years of being stored they will still be good to go (excludes Eneloop Pro). Unfortunately we haven’t been able to test this as we just haven’t got 5 years to wait, but compared to your average dry battery is a huge improvement.

Normally when a battery starts to lose charge you will also see a drop in the output voltage. Thankfully this isn’t the case with Eneloop batteries and even when loosing charge their output voltage will remain constant. You can see this on the graph below where a normal battery will gradually decrease in voltage, and Eneloop batteries voltage will stay constant until it finally goes flat.

Eneloop Voltage Decrease

Along with the batteries there are three different battery chargers available. Instead of us telling you all about them simply check out the table below which gives you the details.

Eneloop Chargers Table


Our Verdict

The Eneloop batteries are a breath of fresh air in the battery world. They hold their charge for longer, while keeping the output voltage constant meaning whatever device you’re using them with will deliver maximum performance 24/7. We also tested the Smart & Quick charger which managed to recharge four AA 2,000mAh batteries in just under 4 hours. This is a huge improvement to the 7+ hours it took with my previous Energizer unit.

I’m very impressed with the 4th generation Eneloop batteries and would recommend you check them out by following the link below.

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