eli5 What makes a AAA battery different from a AA battery other than it being smaller? What’s the actual difference ?
In: Technology
AA and AAA are literally the sizes. That it.
The volume and shape is the only difference. To get a DIFFERENT battery you would have to go to a different chemistry. Like lithium, or lead acid. And those have their own sizes.
Lead acid has the “Group size” standard because virtually all consumer facing uses are groups of cells in series to get standard voltages like 12v for a car. Their sizes usually determine runtime and how hard it can burst. (Without getting into differences like deep cycle, marine, sli, etc)
Lithium usually has a dimension system, like 18650 (18mm diameter, 65.0mm long) for vape and flashlights. Or xSxP for pouch type cells (RC cars, etc) which denotes how many cells in series and how many in parallel. Starts getting technical here so I’ll stop until more is requested.
Alkaline cells just use an alphabet system for sizes; “AA” “AAA” “C” and “D” being the most common for the consumer.
BONUS: 9v batteries are just 6 “AAAA” batteries in series inside a can.
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