Graphene Applications: Where It's Already Working (and Where It's Not Yet)

The gap between graphene’s laboratory potential and its commercial reality has been the central narrative of the industry for two decades. Headlines promise revolution; procurement teams want specifics. This guide cuts through both — mapping every major application sector by what is actually shipping, what is in credible pilot programs, and what remains early-stage research. We use Technology Readiness Levels (TRL 1–9) throughout to give each claim a concrete maturity rating.

The short version: graphene is not a technology of the future. It is already in commercial products across multiple sectors. But the applications that work today are overwhelmingly in areas where graphene serves as a performance additive — not as the primary functional material.

Electronics and Sensors (TRL 8–9)

This is graphene’s most mature high-value application. The UK company Paragraf manufactures graphene Hall effect sensors — devices that measure magnetic fields — using CVD graphene grown directly on non-metallic substrates via a proprietary process. These sensors are commercially available and shipping to customers in semiconductor metrology, aerospace, and quantum computing.

Why graphene excels here: conventional Hall sensors made from semiconductors like GaAs or InSb suffer from temperature drift, planar Hall effect errors, and limited sensitivity at room temperature. Graphene’s two-dimensional nature and high carrier mobility eliminate or reduce all three problems. Paragraf’s GHS series sensors achieve magnetic sensitivity competitive with or exceeding legacy semiconductor sensors while operating stably across a wider temperature range.

Beyond Hall sensors, graphene-based photodetectors are entering pilot production for telecommunications and imaging applications. Graphene’s broad spectral absorption (from UV through terahertz) and ultrafast carrier dynamics (response times below 1 picosecond) make it a natural fit for wideband detection. Several companies, including ICFO spin-offs in Spain, have demonstrated graphene-CMOS hybrid image sensors with sensitivity extending into the infrared.

Printed Electronics and Conductive Inks (TRL 6–8)

Graphene inks — formulations of few-layer graphene flakes or rGO in printable carriers — are in active commercial use for printed circuits, RFID antennas, flexible heaters, and EMI shielding. The technology is mature enough that multiple suppliers (Haydale, Applied Graphene Materials, Vorbeck) sell graphene ink products with documented conductivity specifications.

The value proposition is not raw conductivity — silver inks remain superior for high-conductance traces — but cost, flexibility, and compatibility. Graphene inks are cheaper than silver, mechanically flexible (they do not crack on bending), and compatible with standard screen printing, inkjet, and gravure processes. For applications where moderate conductivity (10–1,000 S/m) is acceptable, graphene inks offer an attractive price-performance point.

Current limitations: ink stability over time (flake sedimentation), print resolution compared to metal inks, and the need for post-processing (annealing or compression) to achieve maximum conductivity. These are engineering problems with clear paths to resolution, not fundamental barriers.

Energy Storage (TRL 5–8)

Graphene’s impact on energy storage is real but nuanced. It spans several sub-applications at different maturity levels:

Lithium-ion battery anodes (TRL 5–7) — Graphene and graphene oxide are used as conductive additives in composite silicon anodes, where they buffer silicon’s volumetric expansion during charge cycles and provide a conductive network. Samsung SDI, Huawei, and several Chinese battery manufacturers have announced or shipped batteries with graphene-containing anode formulations. The improvement is incremental — typically 5–15% improvement in cycle life or charge rate — not the “10x battery” claimed in headlines.

Supercapacitors (TRL 6–8) — Graphene’s extraordinary surface area (theoretical maximum: 2,630 m²/g) makes it a natural electrode material for supercapacitors. Skeleton Technologies (Estonia) and ZapGo (now Allotrope Energy, UK) produce graphene-enhanced supercapacitors that are commercially available. The practical energy density improvement over activated carbon supercapacitors is meaningful (2–3x) but does not approach battery-level energy density.

Conductive additives (TRL 8) — The most mature energy storage application. GNP powders are added to lithium-ion cathode slurries (typically 0.5–2% by weight) to improve electronic conductivity within the electrode. This is a commercial, shipping product from companies like NanoXplore and Cabot Corporation. The impact is modest per cell but adds up across millions of cells.

Polymer Composites (TRL 7–9)

Composites represent graphene’s largest commercial market by volume and the most mature bulk application. The logic is simple: adding small quantities of graphene nanoplatelets (typically 0.5–5% by weight) to polymers can improve:

• Tensile strength — 10–40% improvement at low loadings
• Thermal conductivity — 2–10x improvement for thermal management compounds
• Electrical conductivity — from insulating to anti-static or conductive at percolation thresholds of 1–3% loading
• Gas barrier properties — 50–90% reduction in oxygen permeation rates for packaging films

NanoXplore (4,000+ tonnes/year capacity) is the volume leader, supplying GNP masterbatches to automotive OEMs for under-hood components, structural panels, and wire coatings. Directa Plus supplies graphene-enhanced polymers for sporting goods and textiles. Ford, in partnership with XG Sciences, has used graphene-reinforced polyurethane foam in F-150 truck components since 2018 — one of the earliest automotive OEM adoptions.

The composite sector works because it does not require monolayer graphene. FLG and GNP at industrial scale ($50–500/kg) provide sufficient reinforcement, and the manufacturing process — melt compounding, injection molding — is standard. This is the sector where graphene is most clearly past the hype cycle and into routine commercial use.

Coatings and Anticorrosion (TRL 6–8)

Graphene-enhanced coatings are in commercial production for anticorrosion, thermal management, and barrier applications. The mechanism is well-understood: graphene flakes in a coating matrix create a tortuous path for oxygen and moisture diffusion, dramatically slowing corrosion of the underlying metal.

Applied Graphene Materials (UK) and Talga Group (Australia/Sweden) produce graphene anticorrosion primers that are being adopted in marine, oil & gas, and infrastructure applications. Independent testing shows that graphene-enhanced zinc primers can reduce coating thickness by up to 40% while maintaining equivalent corrosion protection — a significant cost saving in industries where coating represents a major maintenance expense.

Thermal interface materials (TIMs) are another active area. Graphene’s high in-plane thermal conductivity (~5,000 W/m·K) enables TIM formulations with 3–5x the thermal performance of conventional carbon-based fillers, which is directly relevant to electronics packaging, LED thermal management, and EV battery modules.

Concrete and Construction (TRL 7–8)

One of the most commercially promising — and least hyped — graphene applications. Adding small quantities of GO or GNP to concrete (0.01–0.1% by weight of cement) can produce meaningful improvements in compressive strength (20–40%), flexural strength (10–25%), and water impermeability (40–60%).

The headline development: Cemex, one of the world’s largest cement producers, announced a 2025 pilot production line for graphene-enhanced concrete in partnership with Nationwide Engineering. The pilot-scale results reported a 49% reduction in CO₂ emissions per unit of structural performance — achieved not by reducing cement content directly but by producing a stronger concrete that requires less material for the same structural specification. In an industry under intense pressure to decarbonize (cement production accounts for ~8% of global CO₂ emissions), this is a powerful value proposition.

Nationwide Engineering and First Graphene have also demonstrated graphene-enhanced concrete in bridge deck pours and building slabs in the UK and Australia. The construction sector’s conservative adoption timeline means widespread deployment is likely 3–5 years away, but the technical validation is strong and the supply chain (FLG/GO at $50–200/kg, used at 0.01–0.1% loading) is economically viable.

Membranes and Filtration (TRL 4–6)

Graphene oxide membranes can filter molecules based on the spacing between GO sheets, which can be tuned from sub-nanometer to several nanometers by controlling the degree of oxidation and stacking. This enables precision filtration for:

• Water desalination — GO membranes have demonstrated salt rejection rates >97% at water fluxes significantly higher than conventional reverse osmosis membranes
• Gas separation — CO₂/N₂ and H₂/CO₂ separation for carbon capture and hydrogen purification
• Organic solvent nanofiltration — Separating dissolved molecules from industrial solvents

The science is compelling, and multiple university spin-outs (including the University of Manchester’s original GO membrane group) are developing commercial products. However, membrane durability in real-world conditions — fouling resistance, chemical stability under continuous flow, and mechanical integrity at industrial pressures — remains insufficiently demonstrated. Most work is at pilot scale (TRL 4–6) with commercial products likely 3–7 years away for the most demanding applications. Water treatment for point-of-use filtration is closer to market than industrial desalination.

Biomedical Applications (TRL 2–5)

Biomedical graphene is the sector with the highest theoretical potential and the longest road to market. Research applications include:

• Drug delivery — GO’s high surface area and functionalizable surface make it a candidate for targeted drug carriers with loading capacities exceeding conventional nanoparticles. Preclinical studies have demonstrated efficacy in cancer drug delivery, but no graphene-based drug delivery system has entered clinical trials.
• Biosensors — Graphene field-effect transistor (GFET) biosensors can detect specific proteins, DNA sequences, and pathogens at extremely low concentrations. Several groups demonstrated COVID-19 detection via graphene biosensors during the pandemic, with response times under 5 minutes. This is the biomedical application closest to market (TRL 4–5).
• Tissue engineering — Graphene and GO scaffolds have shown promise for bone, neural, and cardiac tissue engineering in animal models. Graphene’s ability to promote cell adhesion and differentiation — particularly for stem cells — is well-documented but far from clinical application.
• Imaging — Graphene quantum dots as fluorescent labels for bioimaging, offering photostability advantages over conventional organic dyes.

The regulatory pathway is the primary constraint. Biomedical devices and drug carriers require extensive toxicology and biocompatibility data, followed by multi-year clinical trial programs. The graphene biomedical sector is generating strong science but is largely pre-commercial.

TRL Summary Table

The Pattern

The applications that work today share three characteristics: they use graphene as an additive (not a primary material), they rely on bulk graphene forms (GNP, FLG, GO) rather than monolayer CVD, and they operate in sectors with short qualification cycles (composites, coatings) rather than heavily regulated ones (biomedical, aerospace primary structures).

The applications that remain 5–10 years out are the inverse: they require graphene as the primary functional material, they need high-quality monolayer or bilayer graphene, and they face long regulatory or qualification timelines.

Understanding this pattern is the single most important filter for evaluating graphene opportunities — whether you are a product developer, a procurement manager, or an investor.

This article is part of the Applications series on Graphene Guide. For how these materials are made, see How Graphene Is Made. For market context, see The Real Graphene Market. For definitions of terms, see the Graphene Glossary.