Check Your Batteries Day – March 9, 2025

History
Timeline
FAQs
Importance
Observe

Check Your Batteries Day is celebrated on the second Sunday in March and this year it will be observed on March 9. While this holiday may seem like it was created by a battery company to raise sales, it was actually created to raise awareness about testing your batteries in your various appliances and having working batteries. These devices alert you to a potentially life-threatening scenario, allowing you to evacuate your family. However, they must be routinely tested (typically by pressing a button) to ensure proper operation. Check Your Batteries Day serves as a reminder to check the batteries in our homes and ensure they are working perfectly well.

History of Check Your Batteries Day

No one knows for certain where Check Your Batteries Day came from, or who first observed it. Check Your Batteries Day, which takes place during Daylight Savings Time, aims to be a useful time to raise awareness about the importance of testing and maintaining functional batteries in household appliances such as smoke detectors, carbon monoxide detectors, radon detectors, and other electronic devices, among other things. These gadgets will alert us to a potentially life-threatening scenario, providing us with the critical time we need to get ourselves and our families to a safe location in time. To ensure that these devices are operating properly, it is critical to check them frequently.

Detectors like these have the potential to save lives if used appropriately. Before the invention of these electronic devices, detecting smoke and carbon monoxide was virtually impossible, and it was often too late once the problem had occurred. It was around the late 1890s that smoke detectors were first introduced into the market. Since George Andrew Darby and Walter Jaeger invented and patented the smoke detector in the early 1900s, and Duane Pearsall later improved on this design in the 1960s, smoke detectors have responded more quickly to fires than heat detectors. In recent years, smoke, carbon monoxide, and radon detectors have saved a substantial number of lives, and changing the batteries in these devices can help to save even more lives.

It is recommended that you change the batteries in your smoke alarm once a month and replace it every ten years to help safeguard your home and family while saving money. Smoke alarms have reduced the average escape time. As a result, update your batteries and replace your smoke alarm batteries this month.

Check Your Batteries Day timeline

1800

The Invention of the Battery

Batteries are invented by Volta.

1890s

The Invention of Smoke Detectors

Smoke detectors are invented in the later years of this period.

1900s

Patenting of the Smoke Detectors

Patenting of the smoke detectors by inventors George Andrew Darby and Walter Jaeger

1960s

Further Enhancement of Smoke Detectors

Duane Pearsall's enhancement to the smoke detector allows it to respond faster than heat detectors, which is a significant increase.

Check Your Batteries Day FAQs

How often should the batteries in fire alarms be changed?

Your fire alarm batteries should be changed at least once a year or whenever it makes a “chirping” sound.

What should be done when a red light shows on a smoke detector?

Generally, a blinking red light means that the batteries are low.

Why does the green light of a smoke detector go off?

It means a smoke or CO hazard has been detected and the device is in silent mode.

How to Observe Check Your Batteries Day

Buy spare batteries
You can run to the store to buy spare batteries for your battery-powered devices. That saves you from running to the stores anytime you need batteries.
Check your smoke detectors
As the name of the holiday suggests, it is important to check the smoke detectors in your home. Ensure you check each battery of each device to ensure it is working perfectly. If any battery needs to be changed do so immediately.
Check other appliances
Check other everyday appliances as well to see if their batteries still work. Your TV remote, alarm clock, camera, and other battery-powered devices may need a battery change.

5 Facts About Devices To Check Their Batteries

The clock
With Daylight Savings Time, it is important to change the batteries in your clock.
Smoke Detectors
Smoke detectors are a very important appliance to check the batteries as they help us detect smoke coming from anywhere in our houses.
Carbon monoxide detectors
Carbon monoxide detectors are a life-saving device that we regularly need to check the batteries of.
The calculators
Calculators are handy devices that simplify calculations for us so change the batteries to continue those complex calculations.
The flashlights
Flashlights are good for checking dark places or if there is a power outage so check the batteries on those devices as well.

Why Check Your Batteries Day is Important

A life-saving holiday
Check Your Batteries Day is a day that can save lives. Just a simple reminder of the day is enough to save lives annually.
It helps us to remember
It can be easy to forget to change the batteries in our homes due to our busy schedules. It is an important day that reminds us to change the batteries in all our appliances.
It creates awareness
Not only does the holiday serve as a reminder, but it is also meant to create awareness. You can share it on your social media platforms or by handing out flyers.