TSA Rules for Batteries and Electronics

• Power banks and spare lithium batteries — cabin only
• E-cigarettes and vapes — cabin only, and not charged in flight
• Lighters and safety matches — cabin only, one on your person
• Smart luggage with a non-removable battery — often prohibited as checked baggage entirely
• Laptops, tablets, cameras — either, but the cabin is safer and faster at screening

This page summarizes published FAA and TSA guidance. Individual airlines may be stricter, and the checkpoint officer has the final say on any item. The authoritative sources are linked at the bottom of this page.

Why this rule runs backwards

Almost every baggage restriction exists because an item could be dangerous in the cabin — a knife, a firearm, a large volume of liquid. Battery rules exist for the opposite reason: a lithium cell in thermal runaway is dangerous anywhere, and the cabin is the only place a crew can see it start and put it out.

In the hold, nobody knows until there is smoke. That is the entire logic, and once you have it, every item on the cabin-only list above makes immediate sense.

Watt-hours, and the conversion nobody does

Airlines write the rule in watt-hours. Every product on the shelf advertises milliamp-hours. The two are not interchangeable and the conversion is not printed on the box unless the manufacturer chose to print it.

A well-made power bank prints its Wh figure on the case. Anker publishes 36.3 Wh for the PowerCore 10000 PD Redux, which is exactly what the formula gives. If a bank displays no Wh figure at all, you have no way to demonstrate compliance if asked — and that is a real reason to prefer a brand that publishes one. Both banks we track and their published figures.

The three thresholds in full

Note the distinction between a battery installed in a device and a spare. A laptop with its battery inside is a device; a power bank is a spare, because its entire purpose is to be a battery. Spares are the restricted category.

The gate-check trap

This is where people actually get caught, and it has become more common as bins fill earlier. You board with a compliant carry-on, the bins are full, and the agent takes your bag at the door. Your power bank is now in the hold, which is exactly where it may not be.

Nobody screens a gate-checked bag for this. The rule is not enforced at that moment — which means the responsibility, and the fire risk, is yours. The fix is a habit rather than a product:

• Keep every battery, cable and charger in one pouch, in the bag that stays with you. That is what a cable organizer is genuinely for.
• If you are gate-checking, pull that pouch out before you hand the bag over. It takes five seconds because everything is in one object.
• The full gate-check guide covers what else should come out at the same moment.

Smart luggage

Suitcases with integrated batteries are permitted as carry-on where the battery can be removed, and are widely prohibited as checked baggage where it cannot. If you own one, know how the battery comes out before you are standing at a gate being asked to demonstrate it.

None of the cases in our carry-on ledger has an integrated battery, which is one fewer thing to explain at a door.

At the checkpoint

• Laptops usually come out of the bag into their own tray, unless the checkpoint has a CT scanner. Pack the laptop where you can reach it without unpacking the bag.
• Tablets and e-readers are frequently treated the same way at US checkpoints. Smaller devices normally stay in.
• Power banks stay in the bag in most cases, but are a common cause of a secondary bag search because they look dense on the X-ray. Keeping them in one pouch makes that search fast.
• PreCheck and equivalents generally let electronics stay in the bag entirely, which is the main practical benefit of the program for a gear-heavy traveler.

Outside the US

The 100 Wh and 160 Wh thresholds come from ICAO and are effectively universal — you will find the same two numbers in the baggage policy of every carrier on our carrier table. What varies is the number of spares permitted and how strictly the approval step for the 100–160 Wh band is applied.

A few carriers additionally require spare batteries to be individually protected against short circuit — in the original packaging, a dedicated case, or with the terminals taped. That is good practice regardless of whether your airline demands it, and it costs nothing.