The UK has retained its position as the second leading market for battery storage in Europe, according to the fifth edition of Aurora Energy Research’s European Battery Markets Attractiveness Report.
In the 2024 version of the report, the UK came out in front of Italy and Ireland to top the list, but in subsequent years, it hasn’t been able to regain its lead. In 2025, Italy led Europe, while in 2026, Germany took the mantle – with Italy falling behind into third place.
Germany’s leading position was driven by rising demand for flexibility as its power system decarbonises, and looks to reduce its reliance on Russian gas. After all, Germany, of all the Western European nations, was one of the most exposed after Russia invaded Ukraine back in 2022.
Despite not taking the lead, however, the UK continued to perform well in the rankings. That was attributed by Aurora to the scale of installed capacity already on the system and the range of available revenue streams. The latest figure for the UK’s installed figure came at the end of last year, with total operational capacity estimated at 12.9GWh after a record-breaking year.
Elsewhere in Europe, the pipeline continues to accelerate. Aurora says installed battery capacity across Europe grew by more than 7GW between 2024 and 2025, taking the total to just above 17GW. By 2030, it forecasts European battery capacity will exceed 80GW.
In a sign of where the market is heading, Aurora expects longer-duration batteries to gain ground as capital costs fall and the need for flexibility rises in decarbonising power markets. The firm projects €24 billion of investment in four-hour batteries from now until 2030, representing more than half of expected battery investment over the period.
“Battery markets in Europe are evolving rapidly,” says Eva Zimmermann, Pan-European Senior Research Associate, at Aurora Energy Research.
“But they are still at different stages of market development: while Great Britain, Germany and Italy are maturing and as a result face issues such as grid connection constraints, more nascent markets only have their first projects coming online in 2026 or later.”
Great Britain is mature, but maturity brings its own problems
As Great Britain’s battery market matures, the ‘easy wins’ of early deployment give way to harder problems: queue management, connection availability, and how a growing fleet of batteries competes for revenues as volumes scale.
That tension – a strong market proposition, constrained by the practicalities of grid access – is not unique to Great Britain. But the report suggests it is becoming a defining theme across the continent, especially as countries try to reconcile fast-moving storage deployment with grid infrastructure and connection processes that were never designed for this level of demand.
Anne Geschke, Pan-European Senior Research Analyst, at Aurora Energy Research, argues that the opportunity set is also changing depending on where a market sits on the maturity curve. “Market players with more risk aversion may look to buy into existing projects in more mature markets, while others may look to establish themselves in markets where batteries are gaining traction only just now.”
That distinction matters. In a mature market like Great Britain, the competitive landscape is better understood, but the most bankable projects are already built, underway, or locked into connection queues. In newer markets, investors may face greater uncertainty – but also the chance to shape early pipelines and take advantage of policy support as it emerges.
New contenders rise in south-eastern Europe
While Germany, Great Britain and Italy sit at the top, Aurora says the competitive map is shifting beneath them. The report highlights that ‘more nascent markets are now gaining traction’, with Romania and Bulgaria now ranking among the top 10 European markets for batteries.
Aurora attributes that rise to a mix of ‘promising battery economics’ and increased policy support. For developers and investors, it is a signal that the European battery story is no longer limited to a small cluster of early adopters. Instead, the next wave may be defined by countries where the first projects are only now being built – or are scheduled to come online from 2026 onwards.
That creates a more complex European landscape: mature markets wrestling with congestion and competition, while newer markets push through first-of-a-kind risks with policy backing and improving economics.
