First EV owners get lifetime battery warranty after China's new safety standard

Chery has announced that original owners of its electric and hybrid vehicles equipped with the company's Rhino battery packs will now receive a lifetime warranty on both the battery and the electric motor, timed to coincide with the introduction of China's strictest EV battery safety regulation to date.

The rule in question, GB38031-2025, officially took effect on July 1, 2026, and is widely regarded as the toughest mandatory battery safety standard anywhere in the world. Rather than simply asking for an early warning before a fire breaks out, the new standard demands that batteries won't catch on fire or explode for a full two hours after a thermal runaway event begins.

Another important requirement of China's new EV battery safety standard is that smoke doesn't enter the cabin for at least five minutes after an event, leaving passenger time to leave the vehicle without suffocating from toxic fumes. In addition, battery packs must be able to survive three separate strikes from a 30 mm steel ball delivering 150 joules of impact energy without catching fire. A new and very important given today's 1 MW charging networks in China rule is that EV batteries must withstand at least 300 fast-charge cycles and still pass a short-circuit safety check afterward.

Chery's lifetime EV warranty pledge

• The entire series meets the latest national standards: All Chery models that have been sold or are currently on sale and are equipped with Rhino batteries have power battery safety performance that meets the latest national GB38031-2025 standard.
• Power Battery Safety Commitment: For all Chery models that have been sold or are currently on sale, if the entire vehicle suffers thermal runaway damage due to a problem with the power battery itself, Chery will compensate with a new car of the same model.
• Lifetime warranty on three electrical components: For first-time car owners whose vehicles are used for non-commercial purposes, Chery offers a lifetime warranty service (covering the three core electric systems: power battery, drive motor, and electronic control unit).

Chery is framing its updated lifetime coverage policy as a direct response to the new regulatory authorities' requirements. It is effectively betting that its Rhino packs can meet these tougher thermal and structural safety rules well enough to back them up with a lifetime warranty, at least for the first buyer. The move also fits into a broader push by the automaker into next-generation battery chemistry, as Chery is working with CATL and Gotion on current-generation cells while targeting mass production of solid-state batteries by 2027.

Whether rivals will match Chery's lifetime EV warranty terms remains to be seen, but NIO has been working with CATL on a push to introduce a 15-year EV battery warranty for first and subsequent owners as mandatory. It argues that otherwise the second-hand EV market will be decimated by millions of first-gen vehicles that will be flooding it by 2030 after their battery warranties have expired.