On September 4, 2026, IFA 2026 (Berlin International Consumer Electronics Exhibition, Germany) officially opened. Themed “The Future is Now”, this year’s IFA gathers over 1900 exhibitors from 49 countries and regions, and is expected to attract 220,000 visitors from more than 140 countries.
The “Leitech IFA26 Reporting Team” dispatched by Leitech (ID: Leitech) is currently in Berlin, delivering timely, comprehensive and in-depth coverage of IFA 2026. As a pivotal exhibition in the global consumer electronics and home appliance sector, this year’s IFA features not only smartphones, TVs, smart home and AI products, but also home energy storage as a key display category. Brands including Anker, Dreame, Bluetti, Jackery, ALLPOWERS INC, and Tuestrong Power are no longer satisfied with producing a simple “electricity-storing battery”. They have begun to integrate photovoltaics, energy storage, household power consumption, dynamic electricity pricing and AI energy management into one unified system, transforming home energy storage from a single hardware category into a home energy access point.
If we trace the development trajectory of the home energy storage market over the past few years, a very clear product upgrading path can be observed: outdoor power station – photovoltaic power generation – balcony photovoltaic energy storage – home energy storage – home energy management.
Pursuing larger battery capacity is now a thing of the past. Today, enterprises are focusing on how to integrate photovoltaic power generation and energy storage into the home energy dispatch system, and reduce consumers’ electricity costs through AI algorithms.
It should be noted that pure photovoltaic power generation “depends on the weather”, and its power generation capacity is directly proportional to the light intensity. During consecutive rainy days, the value of traditional home energy storage will be greatly reduced. It is also a tricky problem to decide when to release the electricity stored in the energy storage device and how to minimize the overall electricity cost.

(Source: Shot by Leitech)
In response to this, Jackery has launched the Ark AI EMS system, which can automatically predict the household electricity demand in different time periods, as well as the photovoltaic power generation output and dynamic electricity price, so as to optimize the charging and discharging strategies.
Anker has taken similar steps. Its Solarbank Max AE111 can be used with photovoltaic panels, with a peak power generation of up to 10kW. MindBase, the home AI data hub, can monitor the presence of people in the house and the working status of home appliances in real time, to decide whether the Solarbank Max AE111 should enter the charging or discharging state.

(Source: Shot by Leitech)
Dreame’s AI home energy management platform LumeGret Orbit is similar to Jackery’s Ark AI EMS system, which can monitor photovoltaic power generation output, dynamic electricity prices and power consumption data in real time to optimize charging and discharging strategies.
The home energy storage system of Aoi Electronics is also integrated with the KARST electric vehicle charging solution, which can intelligently select time periods to charge new energy vehicles.
Considering factors such as the area of power generation panels and light intensity, photovoltaic power generation may not be enough to meet the daily household electricity demand. In addition, during long periods of poor light in the plum rain season, the power generation of photovoltaic panels will drop significantly. It is difficult to reduce electricity costs by relying solely on photovoltaic power to supply power for the whole household.
After the AI control system is added, the system will charge the battery during the off-peak electricity price period, and discharge power during the peak power consumption period to balance the electricity cost. This design makes home energy storage devices no longer dependent on photovoltaic panels, and realizes power regulation by relying on large-capacity batteries. Users can still enjoy the same electricity cost during peak price periods as they do in off-peak periods.

(Source: Shot by Leitech)
Leitech believes that home energy storage is undergoing a transformation of product logic from “storing electricity” to “managing electricity”. In the past, enterprises competed on battery capacity, but now the core of competition lies in how to realize the synergy of photovoltaics, energy storage, power grids, home appliances and new energy vehicles.
Especially after the introduction of AI, home energy storage no longer passively waits for photovoltaic power generation, but can actively decide when to charge and when to discharge by combining photovoltaic power generation output, dynamic electricity price and household electricity demand.
In other words, photovoltaics solve the problem of “where the electricity comes from”, energy storage solves the problem of “when to use the electricity”, and AI solves the problem of “how to use electricity at a lower cost”. This is also the key for home energy storage to truly enter the mass market. In the future, what users buy may no longer be a single battery, but a set of “smart energy stewards” that can continuously help households reduce energy costs.
While the industry is developing rapidly, home energy storage also has a threshold restricting its development — the purchase cost. A set of 10kWh energy storage equipment including an inverter costs at least 7,000 to 8,000 yuan, and even tens of thousands of yuan. Coupled with the cost of photovoltaic power generation equipment, the payback period takes at least several years. In addition to the purchase cost, battery degradation is also a hidden cost of home energy storage devices.
To solve this problem, Jackery SolarVault 3 Pro Max adopts a modular design, supporting capacity expansion from 2.52kWh to 15.12kWh.
Anker realizes modular design based on its PluginPower technology. Anker SOLIX Power Dock is equipped with 4*3600W sockets, supporting a maximum AC output of 4.8kW, photovoltaic power generation of 14.4kW, and an ultra-large battery capacity of 64.5kWh. Users can adjust its output power and battery capacity according to their own needs, which greatly reduces the upfront cost.

(Source: Shot by Leitech)
In addition, as the battery capacity continues to increase, the boundary between home energy storage and outdoor power stations is blurring. Take Jackery Explore 3000v2 as an example. This product has a capacity of 3.072kWh, an output power of 3600W, a peak power of up to 7200W, 8 output interfaces, and can be used with the SolarSaga photovoltaic charging panel. It is both a large-capacity outdoor power station and a home energy storage device.
The EcoFlow STREAM series exhibited by Ecoflow, based on the scalable modular design, can be expanded to a maximum capacity of 90kWh and an output power of 18kW. Its lithium iron phosphate battery has up to 10,000 cycles, and the product has a design life of up to 15 years.
Leitech believes that as modular design gradually becomes mainstream, the difference between home energy storage and outdoor power stations will be further narrowed. Enterprises including Anker, Jackery and Dreame can add modular design to all their outdoor power stations to support parallel output, making each outdoor power station a component of home energy storage.
When users need to use electricity outdoors, they can remove part of the unit from the home energy storage system and take it away. This design can not only greatly reduce the cost for consumers to purchase home energy storage devices and outdoor power stations, but also is expected to attract home energy storage device owners to buy multi-scenario outdoor power stations that can be used both at home and outdoors, and attract outdoor power station users to expand their home energy storage systems, which kills two birds with one stone.

(Source: Shot by Leitech)
Judging from the home energy storage products exhibited at IFA 2026, modular design is becoming an important path for the industry to lower the consumption threshold and expand usage scenarios. Compared with purchasing a large-capacity energy storage system at one time, users can gradually increase the battery capacity according to their household electricity needs, thus reducing the upfront investment and extending the life cycle of the device at the same time.
What is more noteworthy is that modular design is breaking the product boundary between home energy storage and outdoor power stations. When batteries, inverters and energy storage hosts can be flexibly combined, an outdoor power station can not only work independently, but also become a “battery” of the home energy storage system.
In Leitech’s view, this may have greater industrial value than simply pursuing larger capacity. It not only enables consumers to realize “one set of equipment for multiple scenarios”, but also provides enterprises with the opportunity to expand their user base from outdoor power station users to home energy storage users. In the future, home energy storage may no longer be a set of fixedly installed equipment, but a group of energy modules that can be freely combined, expanded on demand, and switched freely between household and outdoor scenarios.
Judging from the products exhibited at IFA 2026, home energy storage is entering a new stage of development. In the past, the core competition of the industry focused on battery capacity, output power and cycle life, and enterprises hoped to use larger batteries to meet more household electricity needs.
Nowadays, as photovoltaics, dynamic electricity pricing, new energy vehicle charging and AI energy management are gradually integrated into one unified system, the competition logic of home energy storage is undergoing fundamental changes.
In this development process, AI will become the “decision-making layer” of the home energy system, enabling energy storage devices to actively participate in home energy dispatch by predicting power generation, power consumption and electricity prices; modular design will serve as the important “hardware foundation”, allowing consumers to gradually expand capacity according to their needs, and promoting the disappearance of the boundary between home energy storage and outdoor power stations.

(Source: Shot by Leitech)
Looking further, home energy storage may also become a new connection node between smart homes and new energy vehicles. Photovoltaics is responsible for power generation, batteries are responsible for energy storage, AI is responsible for dispatch, and home appliances and new energy vehicles become the energy consumption end. When these devices form a closed loop, the role of home energy storage will evolve from a single device to the “hub” of the entire home energy system.
Leitech believes that the real signal released by IFA 2026 is not how many new home energy storage products have been launched, but that this industry is shifting from “selling equipment” to “selling systems”, and from one-time hardware sales to continuous energy services. In the future, what consumers buy may no longer be a fixedly installed battery, but a smart energy system that can automatically generate, store, use and regulate electricity, and continuously help households reduce energy costs.
This is perhaps the most anticipated next transformation after home energy storage truly enters the mass market.
This article is from “Leitech”, authorized for release by 36Kr.
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