Pakistan’s solar boom has always grabbed headlines, but the real story of the country’s energy transition from 2025 through May 2026 is being written in battery energy storage systems (BESS). As grid electricity tariffs climb and net-metering policy tightens, homeowners, businesses, and industries alike are pairing solar panels with lithium-ion battery storage to keep the lights on around the clock. To understand exactly how fast this lithium-ion battery import market in Pakistan is growing, the Pakistan Solar Association analyzed customs-based import data covering January 2025 through May 2026, broken down month by month and by end-use market segment.
This article walks through that data as one continuous 17-month story: the monthly import trend from January 2025 through May 2026, the market segmentation between residential, commercial/SME, and industrial/utility-scale buyers in each year, and a cumulative view of Pakistan’s battery storage demand measured in gigawatt-hours (GWh).
Quick Facts
- Cumulative imports (Jan 2025 – May 2026): 5.39 GWh of lithium-ion battery capacity, worth a combined US $256.94 million.
- Full-year 2025 imports: 3.31 GWh, valued at US $134.65 million.
- January–May 2026 imports: 2.08 GWh, valued at US $122.29 million, already about 91% of 2025’s full-year value in just five months.
- Like-for-like Jan–May growth (2025 vs. 2026): Import Volume nearly tripled, up roughly 188% year-on-year, while import value rose about 167%.
- Market mix is shifting fast: The large industrial / grid-scale segment’s share of imports jumped from 3.2% in 2025 to 13.9% in the first five months of 2026, more than a four-fold increase.
Monthly Lithium-Ion Battery Imports
The underlying customs data forms a single continuous monthly time series running from January 2025 through May 2026. Viewed this way, Pakistan’s lithium-ion battery import market opened modestly at just 0.06 GWh in January 2025 and climbed steadily through the first half of the year: 0.12 GWh in February, 0.11 GWh in March, 0.15 GWh in April, and 0.28 GWh in May, before spiking sharply to 1.03 GWh in June 2025—the single largest month in the entire dataset.
That June 2025 surge lines up with Pakistan’s peak summer heatwave and loadshedding season, when demand for home battery backup and solar-plus-storage systems typically peaks as households look to insulate themselves from grid outages and rising electricity bills.
The trend line resets modestly at the start of 2026—0.20 GWh in January and 0.21 GWh in February—but then breaks into a second, steeper growth wave: 0.39 GWh in March, 0.48 GWh in April, and 0.80 GWh in May 2026, the second-highest month on record. In other words, the market didn’t plateau after the June 2025 spike; it reset and re-accelerated into an even stronger upward trend heading into mid-2026.
Cumulative Market Segmentation
Looking across the full 17-month window, Pakistan imported a cumulative 5.39 GWh of lithium-ion battery capacity, at a combined import value of roughly US $256.94 million. Aggregating the residential, SME/commercial, and large industrial/grid-scale segments across both years gives the clearest possible picture of how Pakistan’s battery storage demand is really distributed.
Residential systems still dominate the cumulative total, accounting for 4.45 GWh (82.5%) of all lithium-ion battery imports since January 2025, underscoring that rooftop solar-plus-storage for homes remains the backbone of Pakistan’s energy storage market. However, SME/Commercial imports (0.55 GWh, 10.2%) and Large Industrial/Grid-Scale imports (0.39 GWh, 7.3%) together now make up almost one-fifth of cumulative demand—a segment that barely registered at the start of 2025.
Total GWh Imported / Segment
Jan 2025 – May 2026
The Large Industrial & Utility Scale Importers
| Organization | Volume | Industry |
|---|---|---|
| Gadoon Textile Mills Limited | 25 MWh | Textile |
| Artistic Milliners (Private) Limited | 8.94 MWh | |
| Sapphire Textile Mills Limited | 25 MWh | |
| Lucky Textile Mills Limited | 15 MWh | |
| Liberty Mills Limited | 30 MWh | |
| Zahra Textile | 5 MWh | |
| Shabbir Tiles & Ceramics Limited | 20 MWh | Ceramics |
| Lucky Cement Limited | 22.7 MWh | Cement |
| National Transmission & Despatch Company (NTDC) | 20 MWh | National grid operator |
Pakistan’s textile industry is spearheading large-scale battery adoption, with major exporters accounting for the largest industrial imports of lithium-ion batteries as they invest in energy security, lower electricity costs, and greater operational resilience.
Battery storage demand is rapidly diversifying beyond residential use, with cement, ceramics, and other energy-intensive industries increasingly deploying BESS to support continuous operations and maximize the value of on-site solar generation.
NTDC’s entry into the battery import market marks a significant turning point, signaling the emergence of utility-scale Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) and highlighting Pakistan’s gradual transition toward grid modernization and renewable energy integration.
What This Means for Pakistan’s Solar and Energy Storage Industry
- Battery storage is no longer a niche add-on to solar; it is scaling in lockstep with Pakistan’s rooftop solar boom, driven by high grid tariffs, frequent loadshedding, and evolving net-metering rules that make self-consumption and storage more attractive than grid export.
- The near-tripling of import volume in Jan–May 2026 versus the same period in 2025 signals that battery storage adoption is accelerating, not plateauing, even as base import values were already substantial in 2025.
- The rising share of SME/Commercial and Large Industrial/Grid-Scale imports points to the early stages of commercial and industrial (C&I) battery energy storage system (BESS) adoption in Pakistan: factories, telecom towers, commercial buildings, and potentially grid-scale storage projects are beginning to import battery capacity at scale.
- Rising average landed cost per kWh in 2026 versus 2025 suggests a shift toward higher-spec containerized BESS units and larger integrated systems, rather than simply more small retail battery packs.
- For solar installers, EPC contractors, and battery importers, the data points to a widening addressable market: residential remains the volume driver, but commercial and industrial energy storage in Pakistan is the fastest-growing opportunity heading into the rest of 2026.
Conclusion
The data compiled by the Pakistan Solar Association tells a clear story: Pakistan’s lithium-ion battery import market grew from a modest 3.31 GWh in 2025 to an accelerating 2.08 GWh in just the first five months of 2026, with cumulative imports since January 2025 reaching 5.39 GWh worth over US $256 million. While residential solar battery storage remains the foundation of this market, the fast-rising share of commercial and industrial battery energy storage system (BESS) imports signals that Pakistan’s energy storage sector is entering a new, more diversified phase of growth.
As solar capacity additions continue and grid reliability challenges persist, the Pakistan Solar Association expects battery energy storage imports to keep climbing through the remainder of 2026, with commercial and industrial buyers playing an increasingly important role alongside the residential market that built this industry.
Muhammad Hammad Shami
Assistant Manager - Research & Publications