Hydrogen-bond-bridged intermediate for perovskite solar cells with enhanced efficiency and stability

Improving the intrinsic film quality of metal halide perovskites is very critical to increase the power conversion efficiency and long-term stability of perovskite solar cells. Here we report a multifunctional, non-volatile additive that can be used to modulate the kinetics of perovskite film growth through a hydrogen-bond-bridged intermediate phase. The additive enables the formation of large perovskite grains and coherent grain growth from bottom to the surface of the film. The enhanced film morphology results in significantly reduced non-radiative recombinations, thus boosting the power conversion efficiency of inverted (p–i–n) solar cells to 24.8% (24.5% certified) with a low energy loss of 0.36 eV. The unencapsulated devices exhibit improved thermal stability with a T₉₈ lifetime beyond 1,000 h under continuous heating at 65 ± 5 °C in a nitrogen-filled glovebox. This effective approach can also be applied to wide-bandgap perovskites and large-area devices to show reduced voltage loss and high efficiency. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.