Hot-Swappable Battery

A battery that can be swapped for a charged one quickly, without powering down or removing screws.

A hot-swappable battery can be pulled out and replaced with a charged one while the device stays powered, or with only a brief pause, usually via a latch or rail mechanism that needs no tools. Strictly, true “hot-swapping” means the system never loses power during the swap (for example, by cycling between two batteries or using a built-in backup supply); many robots marketed as having a “quick-swap battery” are really only fast to remove and install, and still have to be powered off during the swap, so the two should be distinguished. Humanoid and quadruped robots typically run for only one to a few hours per charge, so fast battery swaps are what let them keep working, or keep collecting data, continuously — making this a small but important engineering detail in moving robots from demos to real deployment. A further step is having the robot dock and swap its own battery autonomously.

ExampleRobots such as the Unitree G1 use quick-release batteries, so operators can swap batteries and keep working during data collection.

Also called

Quick-Swap Battery, Quick-Release Battery

Related

Battery Runtime · Battery Management System (BMS) · Autonomous Battery Swapping · Autonomous Docking and Recharging · Humanoid Robot

Sources

Hot swapping - Wikipedia