The 4 metals in a cathode, priced the same way
A cathode is one of the two electrodes inside a battery cell, built to store lithium. Manufacturers buy the metals for it as sulfate salts, not as pure metal. Argonne National Laboratory and Roland Berger priced all 4 of those salts in the same cost model, on the same date. Manganese sulfate costs 0.80 dollars a kilogram, nickel sulfate 3.80, cobalt sulfate 8, and lithium hydroxide 12.50. Manganese is the cheapest of the 4 by a wide margin.
All 4 figures are prices for the salt form of each metal as bought for manufacturing, not for the pure metal itself, from the same cost model on the same date.
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| Manganese sulfate | 0.80 |
| Nickel sulfate | 3.80 |
| Cobalt sulfate | 8 |
| Lithium hydroxide | 12.50 |
A price that does not swing
Manganese also holds its price better than the other 3 metals do. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory built a separate cost model for United States battery factories and held manganese, sodium hydroxide and ammonium hydroxide at a fixed price, because together they make up too small a share of the cost to move the total. Lithium, cobalt and nickel it tracked closely, because those 3 make up more than 70% of the cost of a nickel manganese cobalt cathode, the family called NMC that most electric vehicles use today. Cobalt price fell from more than 80,000 dollars a tonne in April 2022 to roughly 30,000 in May 2025. Lithium carbonate fell from above 40,000 dollars a tonne to around 10,000 over the same stretch.
All 4 figures are thresholds the source states as more than, roughly, above or around, not exact points. The chart draws them at those stated values.
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| Cobalt 2022 | 80,000 |
| Cobalt 2025 | 30,000 |
| Lithium 2022 | 40,000 |
| Lithium 2025 | 10,000 |
Inside NMC, manganese share is falling, not rising
NMC batteries are named for the share of nickel, manganese and cobalt on the metal site inside the cathode. In NMC333, the earliest common formula, the 3 metals split it evenly, 33% each. As manufacturers pushed for more energy density, more driving range from the same size battery, they raised the nickel share and cut the rest. NMC622 carries 20% manganese, NMC811 carries 10%, and NMC955, the highest nickel formula on the market, carries 5%. Manganese share inside NMC has fallen from a third to a twentieth.
The 4 NMC figures are from the same Argonne and Roland Berger cost model as chart 1. The LMFP64 figure is from a separate Argonne laboratory cell, source 1, measured directly rather than modelled.
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| NMC333 | 33 |
| NMC622 | 20 |
| NMC811 | 10 |
| NMC955 | 5 |
| LMFP64 | 60 |
Manganese is moving to the centre of 2 other cathodes instead
That fall inside NMC is why manganese is moving to the centre of 2 chemistries built to avoid nickel and cobalt, not to the centre of NMC itself. Lithium manganese iron phosphate, called LMFP, drops both metals and replaces them with manganese and iron. Argonne measured a cell called LMFP64 that runs 60% manganese and 40% iron on the metal site. It reaches a higher energy density than plain lithium iron phosphate because the manganese charge reaction runs at about 4.1 volts against about 3.4 volts for iron, which lifts the average voltage of the whole cell.
Ford Motor Company and Argonne are also developing a cobalt free lithium and manganese rich cathode, called LMR, which drops nickel too and depends on manganese as the main metal. The paper says cost modelling shows a path to about 500 watt hours per litre of energy density at a cost close to plain lithium iron phosphate. The global lithium ion battery market is predicted to exceed 220 billion dollars by 2030, largely on electric vehicle demand, which is why national laboratories and automakers are funding cheaper cathodes.
The same Argonne and Roland Berger cost model states that nickel manganese cobalt cathode material can account for 30% to 40% of an electric vehicle pack price, so a cheaper metal inside the cathode affects the price of the finished vehicle.