Purchasing a new car can be a daunting task, especially with the world moving towards a greener future. Your options now go beyond traditional autos, as hybrid and fully electric vehicles (EVs) keep making waves in the industry.
One of the biggest concerns people have when switching to a hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) is its battery. How efficient is it? How far can you travel? Finally, how long do the batteries in a hybrid car last before you need to replace them?
Keep reading to find out.
The lifespan of a hybrid car battery can vary depending on many different factors, including:
- Type of the battery. Lithium-ion (Li-ion), nickel-metal hydride (NiMH), and lead-acid are the three most common hybrid car battery types. Compared to NiMH and Li-ion, lead-acid batteries have the shortest lifespan, typically around three to five years. NiMH batteries, on the other hand, last around eight to ten years, while Li-ion batteries can last up to 12 and more years.
- Driving frequency. Frequent drivers may need to replace their hybrid car batteries sooner than those who don’t use their cars so often. The more you drive and discharge the battery, the sooner it will die.
- Driving habits. The way you drive can also impact your battery lifespan. For instance, frequent short trips or enforced stops (in heavy traffic) can put more stress on the battery, while highway driving and consistent speeds can do less harm.
- Lack of maintenance. Every manufacturer provides their own guidelines for maintenance, and not following them can shorten your hybrid car battery lifespan.
- Charging habits can also significantly contribute to the battery’s health. To maintain a healthy battery, avoid frequent deep discharges, excessive fast charging, and depleting it regularly.
- Environmental conditions. Extreme temperatures (both hot and cold) can degrade the battery’s performance and reduce its lifespan. While high temperatures can cause accelerated degradation, cold weather can affect the battery’s ability to hold a charge.
Hybrid car batteries explained
Hybrid cars are vehicles that combine an internal combustion engine and at least one electric motor. Even though this is the structure that defines them all, HEVs still differ in various aspects, including their batteries.
In simple terms, there are hybrid vehicles that don’t need to be plugged into a charging point to be fully charged (self-charging) and those that do. The latter is called plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), and the former definition includes mild and full hybrids.
How hybrid car charging works
Full hybrids cannot be charged from an external power source and rely on the internal combustion engine (ICE) and regenerative braking.
It’s an automated process during which the batteries are continuously charged as you drive, and the car’s internal systems can determine the optimal use of its battery and ICE based on speed, power demand, battery charge level, etc.
Besides operating in combination with ICE, full hybrids can run solely on electric power but only for a short distance (because of small-sized batteries).
Plug-in hybrids, on the other hand, stand in the middle between full hybrids and EVs.
They operate based on the same principle as full hybrids, yet the key difference between the two is that PHEVs come with bigger batteries and an option to charge them using an external power source.
Therefore, plug-in hybrids have a higher all-electric driving range, typically around 50 kilometers on average.
