A 4 V Class Potassium Metal Battery with Extremely Low Overpotential

K metal anodes usually have a low Coulombic efficiency and poor safety owing to their large volume variation and high chemical reactivity. In this study, a three-dimensional K (3D-K) anode is formed by plating metallic K into hollow N-doped C polyhedrons/graphene (HNCP/G). Then a Sn-based solid–electrolyte interphase layer is conformably coated onto the surface of 3D-K to construct Sn@3D-K. Compared with the typical K-foil anode, the Sn@3D-K anode can significantly reduce the interfacial resistance, improve the K+ ion transport mobility, reduce parasitic reactions, and suppress the formation of K dendrites. Meanwhile, HNCP/G serves as a chemically stable, conductive host to accommodate the volume expansion/shrinkage of Sn@3D-K. Owing to these merits, the symmetric Sn@3D-K cell exhibits low voltage hysteresis (9 mV at 0.2 mA cm–2 after 500 h; 31 mV at 1 mA cm–2 after 100 h). When paired with a Prussian blue (PB)/graphene cathode, the K1.56Mn[Fe(CN)6]1.08/G∥Sn@3D-K battery delivers an average discharge plateau of 4.02 V, an ultralow overpotential of 0.01 V, and a high specific capacity of 147.2 mAh g–1, approaching the theoretical value of K2MnFe(CN)6 (156 mAh g–1). A 4 V class K metal battery that exhibits extremely low overpotential and high specific capacity, which are the best among previously reported PB-based K batteries, is proposed.