Best rechargeable batteries for xbox series x controller

(Pocket-lint) - Cycling through batteries for your Xbox controller is both time-consuming and expensive, which is why employing one of the top rechargeable equivalents is an essential move.

Instead of disposing of AA batteries once the juice runs out, you'll be dealing with rechargeable packs that can quickly and easily refill their supplies and dive back into your controller. 

Often, these rechargeable packs will come with a couple of packs, too, which means you can swap between them and always remain in the game. As we detail below, a few of the best options are also compatible with the latest generation of Microsoft controllers, designed for the Series X and Xbox Series S.

Whatever your budget and requirements, we've got the solution for you. 

What are the best Xbox One battery packs? 

1. Venom Rechargeable Battery Twin Pack
2. Stealth Rechargeable Battery Packs
3. Tunrop 4 Battery Charger
4. Rii Play and Charge Battery Kit
5. Smatree Controller Battery Pack

Our Top Pick: Best Xbox Battery Pack

Venom

Venom Rechargeable Battery Pack

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For

• Excellent battery life

Against

• Micro USB is a bit old-fashioned

These battery packs from Venom are extremely popular, and there's a good reason for that.

Not only are they very affordable, but they'll give you up to 18 hours of playtime on a charge.

If your controller starts dying in the heat of the moment, you can just plug it in and continue playing while it charges.

With two packs included in the deal, you can have one on standby, or game with a friend.

Xbox battery packs we also recommend

While Venom's rechargeable battery packs are our top recommendation for those who want something to power their Xbox controller, it's entirely possible it isn't the right fit for your needs, also. That's why we've also tested and recommended the below options, which include play-and-charge kits.

Stealth

Stealth Rechargeable Battery Packs

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For

• Superb run-time

Against

• Fairly bulky design

If you don't need a Stealth kit for your Xbox One that allows you to play while you charge, the rechargeable unit is a good pick, too.

With each unit featuring a 2220mAh battery, you're primed for a long-lasting experience. In our testing, once they had spent a couple of hours in the dock, around 20-25 hours of life from each battery was the standard.

For those thinking about making the upgrade to Xbox Series X or Series X at some point, too, these packs are compatible with the new Xbox Wireless Controller.

Tunrop

Tunrop 4 Battery Charger

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For

• Great for local multiplayer

Against

• Charger be a little fiddly to use

Offering four batteries and a 4-bay charger, this pack from Tunrop is an amazing value.

It's perfect for households with lots of gamers, and also great for single players who'd just like to have lots of batteries on standby.

At 1500 mAh, they aren't the most capacious batteries on our list, but they should see you through some long gaming sessions - and you'll have plenty of spares.

Rii

Rii Play and Charge Battery Kit

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• For
• Simple, easy-to-use design

Against

• Not as long-lasting as other batteries

Rii's play-and-charge alternative isn't quite as long-lasting as others, in our experience, but it's still a very good solution for those who want to keep a consistent charge running to a pair of Xbox controllers.

The LEDs on top of the rechargeable unit let you know when the charge levels are full or running low, with each able to provide power for around 6-8 hours. 

As with any play-and-charge kit, you do have to put up with the cable during charge, but at least Rii gives you the option to match the colour to your pad.

Smatree

Smatree Controller Battery Pack

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For

• Solid battery life

Against

• Slow charging

Another excellent alternative for those hunting a rechargeable duo comes from Smatree, with its offering also compatible with Xbox One, Xbox One Slite and Xbox Series X/S controllers.

While the company claims you get around 48 hours of total playtime, we found that each battery pack typically lasted around 10-14 hours, putting it only marginally ahead of the rest of the field.

As with others, the LEDs also let you know when the packs are fully charged. However, in our experience, they do take quite a while to get to this point, often in the range of around seven hours.

Other products we considered

The Pocket-lint editorial team spends hours testing and using these battery solutions before recommending the best picks for you. We always consider a range of factors when it comes to putting together our best guides, including physically testing the products ourselves, consumer reviews, brand quality, and value. As such, many of the batteries we considered didn’t make our final guide.

These are the products we considered that ultimately didn't make our top five selections, but they may still be worth considering for those who haven't found a product they like in the picks above.

• 6amLifestyle Rechargeable Battery
• Smatree Controller Battery
• Xbox Play & Charge Kit

How to choose an Xbox battery pack

Choosing the right battery pack for your Xbox One controller isn't necessarily the hardest decision you'll ever have to make, but there are a few things to consider before you select one of the picks above. 

Battery pack charger vs. play-and-charge kit

This is the biggest point of distinction between the rechargeable batteries you can get for your Xbox controller. They all roughly do the same job, and that's replacing the need for individual AA batteries, but the way they recharge is fundamentally different - and neither will work for everyone. 

One type, as shown in the picks above, will see you have an external dock for a battery pack. The benefit of these models is that they often come in twin packs, meaning that you can use one while another waits in the wings. However, they don't, of course, allow you to play while it charges - and households who like to use two controllers won't necessarily see the benefit of having a spare battery ready to swap in.

On the other hand, play and charge kits do allow you to, well, play while charging. The downside here is that you'll have to plug in a wire until the pack is recharged, but they are extremely versatile.

How much do you want to spend?

Naturally, battery packs for your Xbox One aren't wildly expensive, but there is a slight variance depending on which type of recharger you go with.

Typically, external recharging docks will usually cost a little more, but this is usually due to the batteries included featuring a higher mAh figure - and therefore packing more life into the same size.

Play and charge kits, while convenient, are often cheaper but offer slightly weaker battery life.

How much you want to spend, as ever, will depend on whether the above matters a lot to your play sessions. 

Is it compatible with your controller?

The Xbox One controller has been out for a long time, and therefore has tons of compatible batteries. By comparison, though, the newer Xbox Wireless Controller (that launched in 2020 with the Xbox Series X and Series S) has less options designed for it. Most, in our testing and research, do work with Xbox's most up-to-date pad, but be sure to double-check this. 

This also applies to those using wireless, third-party Xbox controllers.

More about this story

Every product in this list has been tested to ensure it meets the standards that a recommended pick should.

Testing batteries for game controllers is a fairly time-consuming business, as you might expect, since we have to gauge both battery life and recharge times. Both of these things also have natural variables, in the sense that it's essentially impossible to test just how much power a controller is using in a particular game, or indeed how much power it's actually taking on when recharging. Either way, we tried to perform like-for-like tests when using the options above, in order to gain a broad idea of how well it performs against others.

As with any roundup, it's also not possible to deliver a list that works for every type of user, but we lean on the reviews, experiences and opinions of the Pocket-lint team - as well as thoroughly assessing the areas above - in order to do our best in this regard.

What we always tend to avoid when compiling these picks are granular comparisons and marketing lines; we just want to provide an easy to understand summary that gives you an idea of what each product is like to use. Our verdicts are concise, but this is purely in the interest of brevity.

Writing by Conor Allison.

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