The First Real Products With Solid State Batteries Are Finally Here

For ten years, solid state batteries have been the thing that was always two years away. Longer range, faster charging, no fire risk, coming soon. Then in January, at CES in Las Vegas, a Finnish motorcycle company rolled one onto a stage that you could actually buy.

What actually happened

Verge Motorcycles announced on January 4 that its TS Pro would ship with a solid state pack, and production bikes have since come off the line. Early reservation holders have started taking delivery.

The numbers are the interesting part. The bike offers up to 370 miles of range on the larger pack, and ten minutes of charging adds about 186 miles. Pricing starts at $29,900, so this is a showcase rather than a mass market moment, but it is a real vehicle with a real battery in it.

Cars are close behind. Mercedes has been road testing an EQS fitted with a lithium metal solid state pack from Massachusetts based Factorial, and last year drove it from Stuttgart to Malmö, covering 749 miles on a single charge. The company says the chemistry buys up to 25 percent more range in the same space and weight.

Small gadgets are coming first for most people. Samsung has said it plans to put solid state cells into wireless earbuds late this year, with rings and watches following in 2027, and TDK has been sampling a ceramic solid state cell sized for hearing aids and earbuds.

How it works, in one breath

A normal lithium battery has a liquid soaked separator between its two ends, and that liquid is flammable. A solid state battery swaps it for a solid, usually a ceramic or a glassy material.

Think of replacing the gasoline in a can with a firm gel. The energy is still there, but it will not slosh, leak, or flash.

Why it matters to you

Charging gets faster because a solid electrolyte handles heavy current better without the runaway heat that forces a charger to slow down near the end.

Devices get smaller or last longer, because more of the energy fits in less space. That is why earbuds and hearing aids get the technology before cars do. A few extra hours per charge in something that small is a big deal.

And the fire question mostly goes away. Take the flammable liquid out and a punctured or overheated cell has far less to burn.

Reality check

Two honest caveats.

The first is the label. Solid state has become a marketing word, and it does not always survive a teardown. When analysts at TechInsights opened up a portable power station sold as solid state, they reported finding a significant amount of liquid inside. Read the fine print, especially on cheap gear.

The second is your phone. There is no solid state phone in 2026 and the realistic window is 2027 or 2028. What phones got instead is silicon carbon, a cheaper upgrade that packs more capacity into the same slab. Average smartphone battery capacity hit 5,291 mAh in January, up about 400 mAh in a year, and Honor squeezed a 10,001 mAh cell into a body 8.3 mm thick.

When you can get it

Earbuds with solid state cells are expected late this year. China published a national solid state battery standard in July, which usually signals volume manufacturing is near.

For cars, Samsung SDI has cells slated for vehicles from BMW, Stellantis and General Motors between now and 2028, BYD is targeting 2027, and Volkswagen is aiming at 2027 or 2028 with QuantumScape.

Solid state finally stopped being a press release. It is just going to reach your earbuds before it reaches your driveway.