

Why rechargeable (AA/AAA) batteries not popular? - sunjain

I have been using these for a while. Good value for money and using these is more environment friendly(supposedly). It is difficult to find these in stores, can order it online only. Is it because of the alkaline battery maker's lobbying/deal with stores? Less profit for stores? Consumers don't care, not worth the hassle?
======
archangel_one
Too expensive, performance degrades over time, you have to have a charger for
them and when they run out it takes hours before they're recharged, during
which you can't use whatever it is that needed batteries.

~~~
pwg
Stcredzero's listed amazon AA batteries: $12.95 for four.

Another amazon listing for Duracell 4-pack Alkaline: 4.95 for four.

Rechargeable: $3.24 per battery

Alkaline: $1.24 per battery

3.24 divided by 1.24 = 2.61.

After 3 recharges, the rechargeable has now become cheaper than the alkaline
battery. It seems difficult to believe the performance would degrade
sufficiently after only 3 recharges to justify sticking with alkalines.

As for the lengthy recharge, the solution there is buy a second set. Keep one
in the charger (a good one that goes to trickle when done), when you run down,
swap. Result, no effective wait time for fresh power.

~~~
Travis
I recently purchased 3 sets of AA Energizer brand rechargables. They kept
their charge in some of my electronics for all of 24 hours in many cases.

They seem like a great idea, but in my recent (last 2 years) experiment, the
performance actually does degrade that quickly. It could have just been a bad
batch, but it was 3 separate 4 packs of battteries, all with their own
chargers.

~~~
pwg
If it was the chargers that were packaged together with the batteries, then
the problem was likely the charger destroying the batteries rather than any
fault of the battery itself.

------
antimora
Here is an article on this by Jeff Atwood on his "Coding Horror" blog.

[http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2008/03/adventures-in-
recha...](http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2008/03/adventures-in-rechargeable-
batteries.html)

~~~
sunjain
Thanks. This is very helpful.

------
motters
I use these all the time in many gadgets. They're easy to find in
supermarkets, so it depends where you live I suppose.

------
petervandijck
Stores have incentive to sell goods that expire fast.

