Index / CR1616 / CR1616 vs CR1620

CR1616 vs CR1620: what differs, and which goes where

CR1616 and CR1620 share the same 16 mm diameter, 1.6 mm against 2 mm deep. CR1616 is a lithium cell at 3 V; CR1620 is a lithium cell at 3 V. CR1620 in a holder built for CR1616: too tall, at 3 V against 3 V. CR1616 in a holder built for CR1620: sits lower, at 3 V against 3 V.

Warning — button cell

CR1616 is a button cell: 16 mm across and 1.6 mm tall. If one has been swallowed, or put in a nose or an ear, call the United States national Poison Help line at 1-800-222-1222 straight away and do not wait for symptoms.

Why this shape is dangerous, and the law behind the pack

United States law defines that class by the shape alone — a single cell battery with a diameter greater than its height, 16 CFR 1263.2 — and not by what is inside it. Swallowed, a cell this shape can lodge instead of passing, and it is the current, not the metal, that does the damage.

At 16 mm and 3 V this is the size and the voltage behind the most severe reported injuries: lodged against tissue, a cell this diameter can burn through it in hours, not days.
Reese's Law (15 U.S.C. 2056e) and 16 CFR part 1263 put child-resistant packaging and a warning label on this class; packages manufactured or imported after 21 September 2024 carry it. That is why the pack is hard to open.
The same rule says what to do with the used cell, in its own words: dispose of it at once, keep it away from children, and do NOT put it in household trash (16 CFR 1263.4(b)(3)). Tape over both faces first — a cell too flat to run a watch still has enough left to burn.

Side by side

Every figure below is published by the maker for CR1616 and CR1620; the last column is ours, the difference read off the printed tenths of a millimeter.

CR1616 and CR1620, published figures
Figure	CR1616	CR1620	Difference
Diameter	16 mm	16 mm	same
Height	1.6 mm	2 mm	+0.4 mm
Nominal voltage	3 V	3 V	same
Chemistry	lithium	lithium	same
Capacity	not published	not published	—
Stored energy	not published	not published	—
In the Energizer catalog	listed	listed	—
Sold as	CR1616, DL1616, ECR1616	CR1620, DL1620, ECR1620, 5009LC	—

Either way round

Fit and voltage are separate answers, and they change with direction: the holder is built for one cell, and the other has to live with it. CR1616 is 1.6 mm deep and CR1620 is 2 mm.

CR1620 in a holder built for CR1616 — CR1620 stands 0.4 mm taller and stops the cover closing; it runs 3 V against the 3 V the device expects, the same working voltage.
CR1616 in a holder built for CR1620 — CR1616 goes in and stands 0.4 mm lower, a gap a spring contact usually takes up; it runs 3 V against the 3 V the device expects, the same working voltage.

From BatteryCrossEvery designation in one pageEach code with what it measures and what it replaces

Drawn to scale

Both at one scale. The dashed line marks the height of CR1620: CR1616 stops 0.4 mm short of it.

This cellAnother cell, same scale

How long each one runs

Energizer publishes a capacity for neither, so a running time can be compared only from the other maker's sheet. Both sheets list the size and the 3 V nominal and stop there.

What each one is made for

Both are made for key fobs, scales, trackers and other slow drains that run for years, which is why they end up in the same drawer and get mixed up: CR1616 at 3 V and CR1620 at 3 V. Read the code off the old cell before buying: the device was designed around that one, and the drawing above is how the other one sits in it.

Lithium (CR1616, 3 V) runs at 3 V, roughly double the nominal of the alkaline and silver classes. Of the 26 lithium cells here whose envelope the maker publishes, 3 share that envelope with an alkaline or silver cell.

What the codes and the sheets add

CR1616 encodes 16 mm across and 1.6 mm deep, exactly the published size; CR1620 encodes 16 mm across and 2 mm deep, exactly the published size. Beyond size and voltage, the sheets say this: CR1616 weighs 1.1 g and CR1620 weighs 1.3 g.

Telling them apart in the hand

The code is printed on the flat face of each: CR1616 on one, CR1620 on the other. Stood side by side, CR1620 is 0.4 mm deeper, about 1.25 times the height of CR1616, which a caliper reads at once and a ruler barely shows. If the old cell is gone and the code with it, measure the holder instead: its depth and its opening are what this page compares.

Names on the package

CR1616 has no other Energizer part number, and other brands sell it as DL1616 and ECR1616; CR1620 also appears as 5009LC in Energizer's own part numbers, and other brands sell it as DL1620 and ECR1620. Energizer lists both, which says what is on the shelf under these numbers and nothing about who else still makes them.

Other comparisons: CR1620 vs CR1632.

Which one to buy

Buy the code printed on the old cell or named in the manual. In a pinch CR1616 can stand in where CR1620 sat, at 3 V against 3 V. Both pages carry the full figures and sources: CR1616 and CR1620.

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.