Index / CR2

CR2 battery equivalent: what to use instead

CR2 lithium battery — 3 V, 15.6 x 27 mm. CR2 batteries of any brand are this same cell, and so is a pack sold as a DLCR2 battery or a KCR2 battery. Nothing else in the data shares its size. Battery equivalent chart for every other code.

Also stamped CR15H270

Same cell, other names on the package

CR2 answers to 2 markings outside the standard: DLCR2 and KCR2. They are retail house numbers, and no standards body stands behind any of them, which is why none is printed under Also stamped above.

• DLCR2 — a retail trade marking, not an IEC designation; a DLCR2 battery equivalent is whatever replaces CR2.
• KCR2 — a retail trade marking, not an IEC designation; a KCR2 battery equivalent is whatever replaces CR2.

The cell that differs only in depth

The code says the size, so the cells that get confused with CR2 are the ones that keep its diameter and change its depth. 1 cell shares this diameter at 16.5 mm, and every one of them enters the same opening.

• LR50 — same diameter, 16.5 mm tall against this cell's 27: 10.5 mm shallower, which neither designation carries.
• 4NR43 — 15.2 mm across at 6 V against 15.6 mm here, 0.4 mm apart: loose in this holder.
• MR50 — 16 mm across at 1.4 V against 15.6 mm here, 0.4 mm apart: too wide to enter in this holder.
• On a scale the difference shows before it shows on a caliper: this one weighs 11 g.

Side by side: CR2 vs CR123A.

Nothing else in the data is this size

Nothing else in the data is 15.6 x 27 mm. This cell has the shell to itself, which means a device built around it has no second source: the search for a replacement starts by changing the compartment, not the cell.

Built for a load that alkaline cannot hold

Lithium is here for current, not for size. CR2 delivers 3 V and holds it under a load that would drag an alkaline cell of the same envelope down within seconds. Energizer publishes an operating range down to -40 C (-40 F) for this cell, which is the reason it turns up in outdoor and automotive equipment.

800 mAh in 5.2 cubic centimeters. Density is the whole argument for the chemistry, and it is why the compartment is small. Nothing else in the Energizer data this site reads shares this envelope, so a cell that fits the holder is almost certainly this one. Energizer files it for Asia Pacific and Europe, which is where the part is sold rather than where the cell will work.

• The maker still lists it, under 1 product line: CR2.

Drawn to scale

Every published figure

10 figures are published, and one is not: impedance. The row is absent rather than estimated. It reaches shelves as CR2.

2 rows in the table are not the maker's but ours: stored energy and energy per cubic centimeter. Everything else is reproduced without change.

What the maker says about cold

The sheet for CR2 carries an operating range as well as a capacity, and it reaches -40 C (-40 F) at the cold end. 3 more published figures follow it, and none of them reaches a cross-reference table.

The part occupies 5.2 cubic centimeters and weighs 11 g. Capacity and voltage together put 2400 milliwatt-hours in that space. Energizer files it for Asia Pacific and Europe.

Operating range

-40 C (-40 F) to 60 C (140 F). Below the lower figure the maker makes no claim at all, which is not the same as the cell stopping.

Cutoff voltage

2 V. The published capacity is counted down to this voltage; a device that quits higher up sees less than the whole figure.

Mass against volume

11 g filling 5.2 cubic centimeters. When the printing has worn off, a kitchen scale separates two cells of one envelope faster than a caliper does.

Where the part is filed

Asia Pacific and Europe. That is a statement about the maker's distribution and not about where the cell works.

Is that a lot of energy?

Nothing else measured shares this shell, so the comparison has to go site-wide: 2400 milliwatt-hours in 5.2 cubic centimeters is 462 mWh per cc, denser than 76% of every cell measured here. Density is ours: the maker publishes capacity and volume and never divides one by the other.

More energy per cubic centimeter than most

CR2 packs more into its volume than most of what is measured here: 462 milliwatt-hours per cubic centimeter, above 76 percent of the corpus.

0 of those ones are still listed. Its 462 milliwatt-hours per cubic centimeter sit above 76 percent of everything here that publishes both a capacity and a volume. 2 of the 66 cylinders share its 3 V exactly.

• 3MR9 — the next step down by volume: 4.8 cubic centimeters against this cell's 5.2.
• 7LR44 — the next step up: 6.2 cubic centimeters, 119% of this one.
• 4NR43 — 15.2 x 20.5 mm, 6 V, mercuric oxide.
• LR50 — 15.8 x 16.5 mm, 1.5 V, alkaline.

One figure the maker does not publish

One field is empty for CR2: impedance. A blank means the maker publishes no figure, which is not the same as zero, and it is the reason one comparison below is missing rather than wrong.

The blanks are the same in all 1 record behind this designation, so they are the catalog's silence and not a merge losing a value. What is not missing is the envelope: 15.6 x 27 mm, published and checked against the designation itself.

• No impedance — so this page cannot tell you whether the cell can drive a pulse, which is the whole question in a watch or a sensor.

Before you swap anything

Everything here is computed from published dimensions and nominal voltages. That answers whether a cell enters the compartment and whether the voltage matches on paper. It does not answer what your device does with the difference, and it cannot: a cell that fits can still be the wrong cell.

One more limit, and it is the biggest. This site reads a single manufacturer’s catalog. When a page says a designation is not listed, that means Energizer no longer offers a part under it — not that nobody makes the cell. Other makers may still sell it, and for common sizes they usually do.

A voltage difference is one relation between two cells, and this page prints it from the cell it is about — in every table on the page, including the one listing cells no longer made. A figure always belongs to the cell whose voltage is printed beside it: a cell that runs lower than this one carries a minus here, one that runs higher carries a plus, and two cells at the same nominal voltage carry zero. Meet the same pair on the other cell’s page and the sign is the other one, with the figure taken against that cell instead of this one; where the two run at the same voltage, both pages print zero. The class beside the figure is not read off that figure directly. It is decided on the gap itself, taken against the higher of the two nominal voltages, so one pair of cells gets one class whichever page you meet it on: counted from this side the boundary of the class that still runs falls at 20.0% below and 25.0% above, which is the same gap divided once by the larger nominal and once by the smaller. What genuinely differs between the two directions is the consequence, and the words carry it: a cell that runs low makes a calibrated instrument read below true, and a cell that runs high makes it read above.

3 things this site cannot see. Whether the contacts reach a shorter cell. Whether the device was calibrated for a chemistry that holds its voltage flat, which silver oxide does and alkaline does not. Whether the equipment tolerates the higher current a different chemistry can deliver. Rechargeable cells are never a drop-in for primary cells regardless of size.

Where these numbers come from

Dimensions, voltages, chemistries and capacities are published by the manufacturer and reproduced without change. Everything else on the page is ours, computed from those figures: whether one cell fits where another sat, how far apart their voltages are, stored energy and energy per cubic centimeter, the rank within a shell, and the check of the designation against the measured size.

Fit is decided within 0.3 mm on every axis, which is the order of a contact spring's travel. Voltage classes are decided by consequence, not by roundness, and they are decided on the gap between two nominal voltages taken against the higher of the two: 2.0% or less of it is the same working voltage, 6.0% starts to matter to a calibrated instrument, and past 20.0% it is a different class altogether. Measuring the gap against the higher figure is what makes the verdict the same from either cell’s page, while the printed percentage stays counted from the cell you are reading about. Cells with identical stored energy share a rank instead of being ordered arbitrarily.

Ranking uses capacity times nominal voltage, because capacity alone is not comparable across chemistries: 150 mAh at 3 V is twice the energy of 150 mAh at 1.5 V. Neighbors are chosen by measurement and never alphabetically, because two cells filed next to each other by name usually have nothing in common. A blank in any table means the maker publishes no figure, which is not the same as zero.

Source: Energizer technical data, retrieved 1 September 2026.

The record behind this page

Every figure on this page comes from one catalog record, number 1140, and it is linked below. The sheet is the document the dimensions, voltage and capacity were read out of.

1. [1] Energizer catalog record 1140, active in the snapshot. Technical data sheet: cr2_eu.pdf.

Every figure above is reproduced from those records without change; the comparisons are ours and are described on the method page. Snapshot: Energizer technical data, retrieved 1 September 2026.

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