CATL plans to put sodium-ion batteries into passenger cars, commercial vehicles, battery swapping stations, and grid storage systems this year, according to a report by Caixin magazine on December 29, 2025. The company announced the shift at its supplier conference on December 28, 2025, and it drew attention from across the battery industry.
The move is not a side bet. CATL has already filed its new sodium-ion batteries under the new national standard, and the company told investors in October 2025 that sodium-ion power batteries for passenger vehicles were being developed with customers and that progress was smooth. Sodium-ion batteries use sodium instead of lithium, a cheaper and more abundant element, which gives them a cost edge when lithium prices swing.
The stakes are clear. China's power battery market is heavily concentrated: lithium iron phosphate held 81.2 percent of cumulative installed capacity in 2025, and ternary chemistries took 18.7 percent. CATL is betting that a second chemistry, built on a different supply chain, will let it keep growing without fighting the same rivals on price.
Why sodium-ion now
Domestic power battery installations hit 769.7 GWh in 2025, up 40.4 percent from the year before, according to data released by the China Automotive Power Battery Industry Innovation Alliance on January 16, 2026. When one chemistry owns more than four fifths of the market, growth turns into a price fight. CATL is offering a different product instead.
Sodium-ion batteries are less sensitive to energy density but more sensitive to low temperatures, safety margins, and cycle life. That profile fits grid storage and commercial vehicles better than long-range passenger cars, which is where CATL is starting. The company has also emphasized use in extremely cold environments, a weak spot for some lithium-ion packs.
The Fulin Sodium-ion Battery Energy-Storage Power Station in Wuming District, Nanning City, Guangxi, offers a working example. Its second-phase expansion went into operation on October 8, 2025, and since the first phase started in May 2024 the site has stored and released more than 1.3 million kWh of green electricity. Projects like this let sodium-ion batteries build scale and a track record on the grid side before they reach showrooms.
The numbers behind the bet
Sodium-ion battery shipments ran about 2 GWh in 2025 and are expected to exceed 20 GWh by 2030, according to GGII data. Effective production capacity at sodium-ion battery makers is expected to reach 6 GWh in 2025, up from 1.9 GWh in 2023. That is still a small share of the total market, but it is growing fast.
CATL is not alone. BYD commissioned a sodium-ion mass-production line in Xining, Qinghai, on July 16, 2025. EVE Energy connected its first large-capacity sodium-ion battery energy-storage system to the grid at its Jingmen base on September 24, 2025. Zhongke Haina released a commercial-vehicle sodium-ion solution on April 29, 2025, aimed at power stations and fleet use.
The competitive picture is familiar. CATL ships close to 180 GWh of power and energy-storage batteries per quarter, with energy storage at about 20 percent of that volume. Sodium-ion batteries will not replace that volume soon. They give CATL a second lever when lithium prices or margins tighten.
Sodium-ion versus solid-state
CATL is running two tracks at once. Sodium-ion batteries target near-term orders in storage and commercial transport. Solid-state batteries target a higher performance ceiling but face harder problems in materials and manufacturing. The two are not rivals so much as bets on different time scales.
Solid-state batteries still matter to CATL. The company has not stepped back from that work, and semi-solid-state products from other makers are already reaching small-scale supply. But the premium attached to solid-state now depends on a deliverable schedule, not just a lab result. CATL's sodium-ion push sets a cash-flow benchmark that raises the bar for solid-state claims.
It is not clear that sodium-ion will hold a large share of passenger cars. Energy density remains the open question, and system integration and cost still need work before the chemistry can compete with lithium iron phosphate on range. CATL is betting that its engineering and manufacturing scale can close that gap.
What to watch
The real test is whether sodium-ion batteries move from demonstration projects to normal operation in power systems and industrial storage. If they do, customer requirements for supply stability and fault response will quickly match what lithium-ion storage already meets.
Grid storage demand is less sensitive to energy density than passenger vehicles but more sensitive to low-temperature performance, safety margins, cycle life, and system cost. That is the market where sodium-ion can win first. Success there would give CATL a replicable scale curve and a stable source of growth when lithium-ion margins shrink.
For a closer look at CATL's strategy and the industry data behind it, see the 36Kr report. For background on sodium-ion chemistry, the Wikipedia article on sodium-ion batteries covers the basics. More coverage of battery technology is available in our battery tech section.
CATL's next supplier conference and quarterly earnings call will show whether the sodium-ion timeline holds. If the chemistry reaches mass production by mid-2026 as planned, the battery market will have two viable large-scale options for the first time, and lithium's dominance will face its first real test.
What this means for automakers
Car makers are watching the sodium-ion timeline closely. A second chemistry gives them leverage in price talks with battery suppliers, and it opens a path to lower-cost models for cold-climate markets where lithium-ion packs lose range. CATL has not named specific automaker customers for its sodium-ion passenger packs, but it has said development with customers is progressing smoothly.
The price question is the real one. Sodium is cheaper and easier to source than lithium, but manufacturing scale, yield, and system integration still determine the final cell cost. Until sodium-ion cells ship in volume, the cost advantage stays theoretical. That is why CATL's energy-storage and commercial-vehicle deployments matter: they build the volume that brings costs down before passenger-car contracts are signed.
For consumers, the change will be gradual. Early sodium-ion EVs are likely to be lower-cost models with moderate range, not long-distance flagships. Grid storage customers will see the benefit sooner, since energy density matters less there and cycle life and safety matter more.
The transition also carries risk for CATL. Running sodium-ion, solid-state, lithium iron phosphate, and ternary lines at once demands complex capacity planning and a stable supply of raw materials for each. A misstep in any one line could strain the others. CATL is choosing to compete on delivery rather than on a single technology bet, and that choice will be tested over the next two years.