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Rechargeable aqueous zinc batteries are heralded as a sustainable energy technology but still face technical challenges. The hybrid electrolyte here eliminates hydrogen evolution reaction, the most thorny issue, and allows for impressive battery performance even under harsh conditions.

This Article presents a battery with protons as the charge carrier, as opposed to Li-ion batteries, which rely on the transport of Li-ions. Protons are conducted by means of the Grotthuss mechanism in a hydrated Prussian blue analogue electrode, offering potential for ultrafast rate and long-life batteries.

Rechargeable batteries are governed by reversible intercalation reactions. Here the authors expand the intercalation chemistry to include methyl viologen as a large dicationic charge carrier in aqueous batteries. The bonding between guest and aromatic host is not pure ionic but shows strong covalent character.

Rechargeable aqueous zinc metal batteries represent a promising solution to the storage of renewable energy on the gigawatt scale. For a standardized set of protocols for their electrochemical performance measurements, we highlight the current common issues and recommend practices for future studies.

Facile and scalable fabrication of high-performing sulfur cathodes is challenging in the commercialization of Li–S batteries. The authors report a strategy of simply burning Li foils in a CS₂ vapour for the cathode design, which shows promising battery performance.

Lithium–sulphur batteries may achieve higher energy densities than conventional lithium-ion cells, but the dissolution of sulphur intermediates is a continuing challenge. Here this problem is overcome using a cathode with a mesoporous structure that is able to accommodate intermediate polysulphide anions.

There are intensive efforts in developing anode materials for sodium-ion batteries. Here, the authors present a graphene-titanium dioxide composite as an anode material and show that sodium ion intercalation pseudocapacitance charge storage leads to excellent electrochemical properties.

Aqueous batteries hold promise for large-scale energy storage, but are often maligned because of their low energy densities. Now, a demonstration of halogen conversion–intercalation chemistry inside graphite has blazed a trail for high-energy aqueous batteries.

Formic acid fuel cells require nanosized intermetallic nanoparticles as anode catalysts, but current techniques are poor at producing the small size required. Now, surface-modified ordered mesoporous carbons have been used to produce nanocrystallites as small as 1.5 nm that are extremely active catalysts.

The energy density of electrochemical capacitors can be increased by using a redox-active electrolyte, but such capacitors often suffer from significant self-discharge and low operating voltage. Here, the authors report a new redox-active aqueous electrolyte to effectively tackle the problems.

The high capacity and energy densities of lithium sulphur batteries make them promising for applications, but their widespread realization has been hindered by problems at the interface between the cell components. A conductive mesoporous carbon–sulphur cathode framework capable of constraining sulphur growth and generating electrical contact to the insulating sulphur is now reported.

Anion effects can be well tuned to effectively improve their electrochemical performances in many aspects. This Review highlights the considerable effects of anions on surface and interface chemistry, mass transfer kinetics and solvation sheath structure across various energy storage devices.

This Review discusses non-metallic charge carriers for aqueous batteries, investigating fundamental mechanisms of charge storage and electrode interactions, as well as battery design and performance.

Increasing demand for energy-storage systems will inevitably stress the Earth’s lithium supply; thus, the research focus is shifting towards other alkali and alkali earth metals. This Review compares and connects strategies to enable different multivalent and monovalent metal-ion battery anodes, including metal anodes and intercalation-based, alloy-based and conversion-reaction-based anodes.