Which 18650 Battery Brand Wins?
This head-to-head test of 12 18650 battery options has the measured results for each. See how they ranked and watch the full test video.
LG MJ1
Price shown in test: three dollars and 42 cents
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The quick take
No single winner was declared in this test. Here is where the top-ranked pick landed, straight from the measured results.
Best in 1 of 6 measurements, including Fan Runtime Showdown.
The measured results
Every number below is read straight from the test. Products are listed in the order they finished.
Rated Capacity
- 1LG MJ13500 mAh
10A, made in Korea
- 2Samsung 35E3500 mAh
8A, made in Korea
- 3Panasonic3500 mAh
10A, made in Japan (Panasonic Sanyo), most expensive battery tested
- 4Samsung 30Q (INR 30Q)3000 mAh
15A, made in Korea or Malaysia
- 5Sony Murata VTC63000 mAh
15A, made in Japan
- 6LG HE42500 mAh
20A continuous, 4000mA max charge rate, made in Korea
- 7Samsung 25R2500 mAh
20A, made in Korea or Malaysia
- 8Sony Murata VTC5A2500 mAh
35A, made in Japan (highest amp rating of all cells tested)
- 9BXE9800 mAh
(claimed), made in China per narrator's research
- 10Ultrafire9800 mAh
(claimed), least expensive battery tested
- 11ETSAIR9999 mAh
(claimed), made in China
- 12CASTNOO3000 mAh
made in China
Weight
- 1LG MJ146.8g
and 46.8g (both samples)
- 2Samsung 35E48.79g
and 48.94g
- 3Panasonic47.78g
and 47.76g
- 4Samsung 30Q (INR 30Q)45.77g
and 45.84g (transcript said "forty five point eight for", read as 45.84)
- 5Sony Murata VTC646.65g
and 46.67g
- 6LG HE445.82g
and 45.95g
- 7Samsung 25R43.9g
and 43.92g
- 8Sony Murata VTC5A47.9g
and 47.92g
- 9BXE35.05g
and 36.28g
- 10Ultrafire35.36g
and 35.88g
- 11ETSAIR35.7g
and 35.4g
- 12CASTNOO36.08g
and 35.61g
Internal Resistance
- 1LG MJ127
and 27.3 milliohms
- 2Samsung 35E18.7
and 19.1 milliohms
- 3Panasonic22.2
and 21.5 milliohms
- 4Samsung 30Q (INR 30Q)11.8
and 12.1 milliohms
- 5Sony Murata VTC611.9
and 11.6 milliohms
- 6LG HE412.3
and 12.3 milliohms
- 7Samsung 25R11.7
and 11.7 milliohms
- 8Sony Murata VTC5A9.4
and 9.2 milliohms, lowest of all 12 cells tested
- 9BXE55
and 53.1 milliohms
- 10Ultrafire48.1
and 31 milliohms (two samples differ notably; kept as reported, not averaged or corrected)
- 11ETSAIR57.1
and 46.1 milliohms
- 12CASTNOO71.5
and 76.3 milliohms, worst of all 12 cells tested
Capacity Test 1000 M A
- 1LG MJ1
measured 3404 and 3389 mAh vs 3500 mAh rated
- 2Samsung 35E
measured 3276 and 3234 mAh vs 3500 mAh rated (93 percent of rating)
- 3Panasonic
measured 3450 and 3484 mAh vs 3500 mAh rated
- 4Samsung 30Q (INR 30Q)
measured 2985 and 3002 mAh vs 3000 mAh rated (99.8 percent of rating)
- 5Sony Murata VTC6
measured 2969 and 2961 mAh vs 3000 mAh rated
- 6LG HE4
measured 2524 and 2524 mAh, slightly exceeding its 2500 mAh rating
- 7Samsung 25R
measured 2545 and 2528 mAh, exceeding its 2500 mAh rating
- 8Sony Murata VTC5A
measured 2459 and 2425 mAh vs 2500 mAh rated
- 9BXE
measured 1194 and 1244 mAh vs 9800 mAh claimed rating (12 percent of claimed rating)
- 10Ultrafire
measured 1230 and 1163 mAh vs 9800 mAh claimed rating (12 percent of claimed rating)
- 11ETSAIR
measured 1299 and 1298 mAh vs 9999 mAh claimed rating (13 percent of claimed rating)
- 12CASTNOO
measured 718 and 651 mAh vs 3000 mAh rated
Cold Temperature Capacity
- 1LG MJ1
close to or over 90 percent of rated capacity
- 2Samsung 35E
close to or over 90 percent of rated capacity
- 3Panasonic
close to or over 90 percent of rated capacity
- 4Samsung 30Q (INR 30Q)
close to or over 90 percent of rated capacity
- 5Sony Murata VTC6
close to or over 90 percent of rated capacity
- 6LG HE4
very little impact from cold (grouped with Samsung 25R as best cold performers)
- 7Samsung 25R
very little impact from cold (grouped with LG HE4 as best cold performers)
- 8Sony Murata VTC5A
close to or over 90 percent of rated capacity
- 9BXE
well below 25 percent of rated capacity
- 10Ultrafire
well below 25 percent of rated capacity
- 11ETSAIR
well below 25 percent of rated capacity
- 12CASTNOO
well below 25 percent of rated capacity
Fan Runtime Showdown
- 1LG MJ1307 minutes
best of all 12 batteries tested
- 3Panasonic
transcript renders the time as "two hundred in ninety three" (likely 293 minutes, a split/garbled number); kept as reported, not corrected
- 4Samsung 30Q (INR 30Q)277 minutes
- 5Sony Murata VTC6262 minutes
- 6LG HE4242 minutes
- 7Samsung 25R228 minutes
- 8Sony Murata VTC5A214 minutes
- 9BXE104 minutes
- 10Ultrafire102 minutes
a few seconds longer than ETSAIR
- 11ETSAIR102 minutes
stopped before Ultrafire
- 12CASTNOO69 minutes
first of all 12 to quit
- 2Samsung 35Enot tested
High Drain Voltage Sag
- 1LG MJ13.87V
at 9A, 3.19V at its 10A rating (its own rated max)
- 2Samsung 35E
not tested at 10A since only rated for 8A
- 3Panasonic3.95V
at 2A, 3.87V at 3A (rated 10A max)
- 8Sony Murata VTC5A3.5V
at 10A, 3.27V at 15A (best of 5 brands rated 15A+), 3.04V at 20A (best of 3 brands rated 20A+)
- 9BXE2.82V
at 4A
- 10Ultrafire3.8V
at 2A, 3.5V at 4A, 3.27V at 5A
- 11ETSAIR3.27V
at 4A, 2.59V at 6A
- 12CASTNOO1.98V
at 4A, dropped below 1V soon after (first to be eliminated from the load test)
- 4Samsung 30Q (INR 30Q)not tested
- 5Sony Murata VTC6not tested
- 6LG HE4not tested
- 7Samsung 25Rnot tested
Cost Per Mah Per Penny
- 1LG MJ110.5 mAh
per penny
- 2Samsung 35E6.7 mAh
per penny
- 4Samsung 30Q (INR 30Q)6.9 mAh
per penny
- 6LG HE48.4 mAh
per penny
- 7Samsung 25R7.4 mAh
per penny (transcript said "7 point for", read as 7.4)
- 8Sony Murata VTC5A
described as about the same value as the Chinese brands, no exact figure given
- 3Panasonicnot tested
- 5Sony Murata VTC6not tested
- 9BXEnot tested
- 10Ultrafirenot tested
- 11ETSAIRnot tested
- 12CASTNOOnot tested
How it was tested
- 1000mA charge then discharge capacity test vs each brand's rated mAh
- internal resistance measurement (milliohms) at full charge
- cold temperature capacity retention at 6F / minus 14C
- cost per mAh per penny (value calculation)
- voltage sag under increasing amp load, 1A up to each cell's rated max
- fan-powering runtime showdown, all cells fully charged, longest to power a fan wins
Data notes and caveats
This video does not crown one overall winner. Its thesis is a myth test on a claim (do cheap Chinese-branded cells with inflated 9800-9999 mAh ratings really deliver 3-4x the capacity of name brands), not a single-victor showdown, so winner/runnerUp/budgetPick are left null per spec even though the closing narration clearly concludes Korean (LG, Samsung) and Japanese (Sony, Panasonic) cells are high quality while the four Chinese cells (Ultrafire, ETSAIR, CASTNOO, BXE) only delivered 12-24 percent of their claimed capacity. The fan-powering runtime showdown is the only test that ranks all 12 cells against each other in one ordered list, so products[] is ordered by that result (LG MJ1 best at 307 minutes, CASTNOO worst at 69 minutes); LG MJ1 also had the best cost-per-mAh figure (10.5 mAh/penny), making it the closest thing to an implied top pick, but no transcript sentence declares it the winner. Brand order/prices in the transcript map cleanly 1:1 onto the description's 12-brand Products Tested list (Ultrafire, LG HE4, LG MJ1, Samsung 25R, ETSAIR, CASTNOO, BXE, Samsung 30Q, Samsung 35E, Sony VTC6, Sony VTC5A, Panasonic in ascending price order), so brand resolution is high confidence. The high-drain voltage-sag load test (1A-10A+) groups results as 'the first six/seven/eight brands' without always naming which cells are in that group; only explicitly-named per-brand data points from that test were kept, the rest were omitted rather than guessed at group membership. Two numbers are garbled and were kept verbatim rather than corrected: ETSAIR's price ("three dollars and sixty says") and Panasonic's fan-showdown finish time ("two hundred in ninety three", likely 293 minutes).
