TI announces industry’s highest-cell-count EIS-enabled battery monitor
Texas Instruments has introduced the industry’s highest-cell-count battery monitor with an integrated electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) engine, bringing predictive intelligence, data and real-time diagnostics to battery monitoring in electric vehicles (EV) and energy storage system (ESS) applications.
The BQ79826Z-Q1 battery monitor enhances safety and extends battery life by detecting potential failures from within battery cells. The single chip delivers the highest-cell-count monitoring in its class, tracking up to 44% more channels than previous generations. With this increase in channels, the device decreases the number of components required in a battery pack, reducing system complexity and cost without compromising reliability.
Just as an electrocardiogram (ECG) monitors the heart, EIS monitors a battery. It delivers continuous, real-time insight that reveals the battery’s health and warns of issues before they become critical. Integrated EIS technology enables the BQ78926Z-Q1 to detect fault conditions earlier – from inside the cells – helping maintain safety and notifying passengers of potential vehicle hazards such as thermal runaway.
These same benefits extend to ESSs, where reliable battery monitoring is critical to meeting the growing power demands of artificial intelligence data centres. As effective storage solutions become increasingly vital in the grid-to-gate ecosystem, EIS gives engineers real-time visibility into the state of charge and state of health of each battery cell, regardless of system size.
The performance of an EV or ESS is fundamentally affected by the quality and efficiency of its batteries. The BQ79826Z-Q1 supports up to 26 cells per device, eight more than any competing solution, setting a new industry standard. Fewer monitoring devices means a lower bill of materials, simplified architecture and reduced board space requirements, translating to meaningful cost savings per channel without sacrificing quality or reliability.
When paired with the BQ79881-Q1 pack monitor and optional TI communications bridge, these devices create a powerful chipset that works across different module sizes, battery chemistries and mechanical designs, giving engineers the flexibility to design once and deploy everywhere. This scalability reduces engineering overhead and accelerates time to market for automotive and energy storage designers.
With a voltage accuracy of <2mV across a full temperature range of –40°C to +125°C, higher resolution analog-to-digital converters and ultra-low noise, the BQ78926Z-Q1 enables more accurate state-of-charge calculations, directly addressing one of the biggest concerns for EV drivers: range anxiety. Utilising EIS technology, this device enables more accurate temperature and state-of-charge estimation, helping designers achieve longer battery life and faster charging without compromising battery health. With an EIS measurement time that is five times faster than previous solutions, this device delivers the highest functional safety voltage reading per cell.
Visitors to PCIM can see new products and solutions from TI that are enabling engineers to innovate what’s next in power in Hall 7, Booth No. 652. The new BQ79826Z-Q1 battery monitor will be featured in an EIS-enabled BMS reference design, alongside other innovations such as an 11kW single-stage bidirectional onboard charger, a 50kVA solid-state transformer cell stack with Ethernet and Fast Serial Interface communication and short-circuit protection for silicon carbide power metal-oxide semiconductor field-effect transistors with technology from Flex.
