Lithium-ion is the most popular technology in laptop battery and notebook battery design today. Nearly all modern laptops use a lithium-ion battery.

The basic technology of a lithium-ion laptop battery involves lithium ions which move from a negative electrode to a positive electrode when discharging, or providing power, and move from a negative electrode to a positive electrode when being charged.

In addition to laptop batteries and notebook batteries, lithium-ion batteries are used in nearly every type of electronics device that uses battery power, including cell phones, PDAs, mp3 players, and more. Lithium-ion batteries are even being used for electric vehicles, defense, and aerospace.

One of the advantages of lithium-ion batteries is their light weight, which makes them perfect for portable devices. Lithium-ion batteries can also come in a wide variety of sizes and shapes, so that they can fit different form factors, especially for small devices such as cell phones. Lithium-ion batteries also have no “memory effect”, which is a problem that occurred in older technologies in which a battery could lose some of its capacity if it were not completely discharged about once a month.

There are disadvantages to lithium-ion laptop batteries, however. Lithium-ion laptop and notebook batteries are very sensitive to heat. Excessive heat can cause batteries to swell, malfunction, and in extreme cases, even catch fire or explode. Excessive heat will also cause a lithium-ion battery to lose some of its capacity, causing it to need replacing much sooner. Lastly, lithium-ion laptop batteries tend to lose some capacity every time they are charged and discharged, as deposits form in the battery. Most notebook batteries lose around 10 to 20% of their capacity each year, but may lose more or less depending on how much they are used.

Although many laptop battery recalls in recent years have included mainly lithium-ion laptop and notebook batteries, it is generally a very safe technology, as long as the batteries are not exposed to excess heat.