Finnish-Estonian bikemaker Verge has been in loads of headlines up to now few years. Now, it’s time for its spin-off accomplice firm, Donut Lab, to get its justifiable share of eyeballs. The corporate has been engaged on solid-state battery tech for some time, and it appears it’s lastly seeing some worthwhile outcomes.
Donut Lab lately launched its first pack-level charging take a look at outcomes – its fourth battery take a look at with Verge Bikes. Its 18 -kWh battery pack maintained over 100 kW of charging energy at a 5C charge for 5 minutes on the Verge TS Pro electrical motorbike.
These are a few of the first real-world take a look at numbers we’ve seen from Donut Lab’s battery in an electrical motorbike. The corporate introduced a 400-Wh/kg solid-state cell at CES 2026 with claims of a 370-mile vary, 100,000-cycle life, and a five-minute charging time, and most significantly, it was claimed to be cheaper to provide than lithium-ion batteries.
So it was about time Donut Lab received to supporting its daring claims with real-world numbers.
Donut Lab
Donut Lab revealed that it was producing a solid-state EV battery again in January, and that deliveries would start by the top of the quarter. That will successfully make the brand new Verge TS Professional the “world’s first manufacturing automobile with an all-solid-state battery.” Nonetheless, skepticism greeted these bulletins immediately.
What adopted had been three vital exams with Finland’s state-run VTT Technical Analysis Centre. The first test verified that the battery’s cells do, the truth is, help fast cost. The second test advised that the battery cells may stay inside a secure temperature vary so long as there are enough warmth sinks. The third test confirmed that the Donut Lab battery was not a supercapacitor as many had been suggesting, however moderately has a self-discharge charge akin to a real battery.
What follows now’s the fourth, and maybe crucial take a look at up to now. Donut Lab related a Verge TS Professional to a public fast-charger, which produced 100–103 kW of electrical energy for 5 minutes.
Sneak Peek at Verge’s Upcoming Stable-State Battery Pack | I Donut Consider (Pt.4)
On this take a look at, the battery pack charged from 10% to 50% in 5 minutes, reaching 70% in little over 9 minutes, and subsequently reaching 80% in 12 minutes. That is all whereas utilizing an air-cooled design as a substitute of liquid cooling. That half is particularly vital as a result of nearly all of electrical automotive battery packs (that are about 5 occasions larger) use liquid cooling methods to keep up related charging charges with out thermal throttling.
What’s much more spectacular is that these figures put the system among the many fastest-charging electrical bikes ever. And to see this on an actual motorbike makes this take a look at much more instrumental – in distinction to earlier experiments that targeting single cells in rigorously regulated laboratory settings.
Anybody who is aware of something about battery tech will let you know simply how sophisticated quick charging on a motorbike is, in comparison with vehicles. Because of tighter temperature limits and fewer cells sharing the load, and smaller battery packs sometimes restrict charging speeds.
“The excessive power density of our battery know-how allows versatile battery pack design and superior efficiency even in more difficult purposes, reminiscent of bikes, the place area is proscribed, and system simplicity is essential,” says Ville Piippo, CTO at Donut Lab. “We’re capable of provide automobile producers packs with totally different power capacities in the identical bodily dimension, with even the smallest packs having very excessive capacities.”
Donut Lab
Donut Lab’s know-how appears to keep up over 100 kW of charging energy in such a compact structure. However that’s to not say that the corporate has achieved all its objectives. That’s as a result of this take a look at reaches solely round half of the height charging charges (of as much as 200 kW) that the corporate had beforehand hinted at. As of this time, it’s unsure if system design, charger constraints, or steady optimization are responsible.
Donut Lab has additionally printed one other take a look at carried out by VTT that evaluates the cell’s skill to function safely after sustaining harm. A broken cell was used, and it underwent 50 fast-charge cycles at 5C and 5 1C cycles. There was no reported threat of fireplace or temperature rises. On this case, the broken Donut Battery failed “gracefully,” persevering with to operate safely at a decrease capability as a substitute.
The corporate’s I Donut Believe webpage (pun supposed, most likely) exhibits that extra take a look at outcomes are about to be revealed.
Donut Lab
You might argue it’s extra a PR stunt than the rest, but it surely does, nevertheless, validate one thing maybe extra important: the corporate’s know-how can produce important efficiency positive aspects on an actual motorbike, and never solely within the lab.
Possibly we’re not too distant from an actual mass-market 5-minute charging electrical motorbike.
Supply: Donut Lab
