Do rechargeable batteries always outlast disposables?

Yer, I agree I think both types of batteries have their place. Must admit I’ve never heard of “chargers that will actually charge 1.5v disposable batteries when used as top ups of the partially discharged ones” though, so thanks for that!

I use both types and find that each have good and bad points. I mainly use AA batteries for all sorts of applications and find that overall they are more cost effective when rechargeable.
However my understanding is that they do not recharge indefinately and this has been my experience over the years. They also lose their charge fairly quickly.
As a keen photographer I usually have my small camera with me when going out on walks, cycle rides etc and on more than one occasion have been let down by rechargeable batteries both in the camera and the spares I always carry even when they had only been charged up a week or so earlier and the camera hardly used. A bit of a pain when you have travelled 100miles plus to see something. I could always charge them up immediately before use but frankly don’t always have the time if I go somewhere at short notice nor is it good for the batteries if you keep full charging them and then let the charge run out because you don’t use them or so I have been told.
I now use ultimate lithium batteries for that camera and carry a spare pack. They last for months and I always know there is a fully charged pack available to change to.

I use non-rechargeables in things like TV remotes.

In most other things I use rechargeables. In these things I would include cameras at the high end and motorised pepper and salt grinders at the low end. In between there would be torches, of the halogen and conventional bulb type.

What I do make sure of is that they are all high capacity at around 2800 mAh. My digital Fuji camera especially requires these.

The report in Which magazine reported on several well known brands but I have found that Aldi sell thier own particular batteries (of all popular sizes) and not only are they high capacity, (well over 2000 mAH), but they are cheap too.

What the report doesn’t actually say is that if you are going for a high capacity rechargeable is that you need a good charger that will cope with the capacity. Chargers are often supplied with a set of batteries at outlets such as Comet and Jessops and the charger will be suitable for what ever batteries come with it, but if higher capacity batteries are inserted the charging period increases dramatically.

If you go for a charger that is typically 250mA for 4 x AA type batteries, increasing the capacity this could mean that it will take more than 24 hours to charge 4 x 2800 mAh batteries.

The supplier I went to had a formula which unfortunately I have forgotten for the moment but any good supplier will be able to let you know this so that you can come to an informed decision when purchasing.

I think it very unlikely that buying a set of 8 rechargeable batteries would save £500 over 100 charge cycles or anything like that amount ! My experience has been that such batteries are thrown away well before much profit is seen.
When they are new, rechargeables seem to achieve their nominal capacity and retain it over fairly long storeage periods but after perhaps as few as 10 charge/recharge cycles, their ability to retain their charge for long periods seems to drop off significantly. That has been my experience, particularly with AA rechargeable batteries of ~2500mAh capacity made by a well-known manufacturer recommended in this latest article !!
When used in cameras or portable audio recorders the batteries tend to spend long periods inactive however the user absolutely depends on them working on demand say after 1 month, or even 3+ months. It is quite infuriating to find that batteries are flat when you know they have hardly been used. This is the point when they end up in the bin !
I think the Which testing has missed this point so the results are not as informative as they might be. It would be more useful to put batteries on test through say 10-20 charge /recharge cycles and only then measure their % charge retention after 1, 2, 3 months on the shelf.
It does seem to be the case that the newer ‘hybrid’ rechargeables are much better at retaining their charge over long periods. This could be confirmed by conducting the tests as above. Then we would all know whether to buy more rechargeables or go back to using the old reliable – Duracells.
I have had good results so far with Maplin hybrid rechargeables however.

Making comaprisions is difficult enough without vendors saying the same thing in differnet ways .. and even Which does it.. in their article they mention that one brand ‘retained 90% of their charge after 50 days’ and then that another brand ..’losing 11% of their capacity after 50 days’.
so we have 90% vs 89% … Please keep the language straightforward.

I found it astonishing that the Which? article didn’t point out – as Richard has done above – that rechargeable AA batteries operate at a lower voltage than disposables. They are simply not appropriate for many devices that use 4 disposable AA batteries as they’ll deliver 4.8 V instead of 6.0 V – a big difference.
My own experience of rechargeables, in common with other commenters here, is that they don’t sustain adequate performance for many charges. Even worse, if they’re left unused for any length of time, or if they’re left in a device that is also plugged into the mains (e.g. my wireless doorbell) they become useless.

I have bought some “Ultra Max” AA Ni-MH batteries from Poundland at £1 for 2

They are shown as 800mAh and upto 1000 X

They are replacing some uniross batteries that did not hold their charge in a hand held magnifier light that is used intermitently.

I suspect that the low initial cost but more frequent re-charging will make evaluating these batteries difficult.