ANCEL BA101 Car Battery Tester 12V Auto 100-2000 CCA Battery Load Tester

It’s looks really do hide a truly great performing battery tester. A very good range of tests, all carried out with the most important factor - accuracy. Others on the market do ‘look’ better, where this just works as it should, and at a very good price point. The only way it could be improved would be the inclusion of a suitable storage case in place of the small card box it arrives in. Low cost and high performance. Superb little tool to have about.

Load testing the health of your car battery CCA (Cold Cranking Amps) and whether the battery can retain the charge is important to know when having diesel vehicles especially for those colder mornings - don't get caught out!. It's easy to use, does what it says and clearly displays the results. I've always used the multi-meter method for checking the alternator charge but this does that to. I'm not intending to use the report and download feature but that could be useful in a commercial sense. I Should have bought one of these tools years ago.

Very handy piece of kit for small money. Had a battery go bad on a vintage vehicle. Tried charging but the CCA was gone to low on the battery.

Have so many batteries around. Project farm vid said this is best for the £. Looks like all my old batteries are no good! No real way of double checking. But does say known good batteries are good. Recommended.

Great little tester. Easy to use and really accurate too. You need to know some basic info about your car battery type and capacity (can usually be found on your battery if you don’t know) Reports battery health as well as state of charge and voltage. Can also test your car’s charging system (alternator) to see if the cars charging the battery You can also run a cranking test to see how the battery performs under load. There’s a good review of it on YouTube (projectfarm) if you want to see it beat other models much more expensive than this one.

Simple to use but accurate and most importantly gives internal resistance. I bought a brand new Bosch batter from EuroParts and when I got home, before fitting it to my car, tested the battery. It showed 72% health and 9.54 internal resistance. Charging it overnight did not make any difference. I took it back and the guys in Europarts were brilliant, no quibble, they got out another Bosch battery and that too tested 87% health. Finally a cheaper "own brand" (I think made by Lion) and this showed 99% health so I bought that instead and save myself £20. After charging overnight it now tests 100% health and all other tests are perfect. I will never purchase a new car battery again without my test meter. There is no other way of knowing how "good" the battery really is without knowing things like the internal resistance. The battery test meter used in the shop by Europarts looks expensive and produces a nice paper print out of the results but it does not test internal resistance so is really a waste of time. Incidentally, testing the 2 year old battery in my son's car also showed 100% health.

Good value for money

Works perfectly and a very reasonable price Would definitely recommend

LATEST UPDATE: The Ancel folks got the virus out of their print software, and appear to have gotten the issues with their web certificate fixed as well. Now all is good! I upped the rating to 5 stars, which it now deserves. It's great to be able to print out the test results of your battery, cranking system and charging system and show it to your mechanic. When testing your battery, you can use the CCA, or cold cranking amps, setting and set it for the number of cold cranking amps your car has. This is a great feature. There are a number of places on the Internet to find the CCA rating for your battery. Anyway, this BA 101 unit has become a mainstay in my "car tool bag" for keeping tabs on the battery and charging system. It will let you know if your alternator is in the act of biting the dust, or if your battery needs to be replaced. It's better to replace a dying battery on your own schedule than to wait until it dies in a parking lot in a blizzard! This has to be better than most of the testers on the market. Scotty Kilmer, in his Youtube channel, raved about another scanner that did not have all the capabilities of this one. Oh--if you got the CD with your scanner, don't use it--go to the web site at anceltech.com and download the latest drivers and software. That way you won't get anything loaded on your computer (for printing) that should not be there! UPDATE: I received a response from Anceltech's customer support team. She assured me that the software did not contain a virus and they would try to fix their web site so Norton anti-virus would not recommend against going there. Well, I tried the web site this very day--and I get a message that the web site's certificate is not valid. So, that issue is not fixed. Until it is, I'm not going to try to download the software again. This is an example of how a company could make a potentially great product, but mess up big time by having an invalid web site certificate, and allowing someone to stick a virus into the software. The software for printing was kludged together in any event. Now, I think the tester itself is great, and you could use it without printing out the results. But I hate it when a feature is advertised and that feature is so problem-laden that it doesn't work properly. So, Anceltech has two very simple things to fix: (1) its web site certificate and (2) cleaning the virus out of its software. Why this is so difficult for them I cannot imagine. I got this battery and charging system tester because I have been having trouble with the battery in our Ford. The Ford dealership had the car in its shop on two occasions, first taking a month to replace a defective engine, and second, taking three weeks to procure and install a new flywheel in the transmission. At neither of these times was the battery put on a charger. The battery is a Motorcraft premium battery with a 36-month free replacement guarantee---but a week ago I had to get a boost from CAA because it was dead as a doornail. I took it to my mechanic and it tested as good after about a week of driving it every day. But then I got this Ancel battery tester and hooked it up to the battery. Two days ago, the tester showed 100% healthy battery, but zero charge! Today, after more driving, it was up to 12% charge. So tomorrow I'm taking it to the mechanic to have it put on a battery charger all day long. Apparently this battery may have sulphated or otherwise just not got back up to a full charge. If driving it 30 km a day for a week doesn't charge beyond 12%, I know something else is needed. So--stay tuned! I will let everyone know what the tester says after a the battery gets charged up on a trickle charger! UPDATE: I am lowering the rating to two stars. The battery tester itself is GREAT. However, when you try to access the manufacturer's web site at anceltech.com, Norton Antivirus warns you that it contains a Trojan. Well, I accessed the site anyway, because I was having printing problems, and sure enough--Norton detected a virus inside the software I downloaded. Now, again, the device itself is great--it will tell you things about your battery that are missed by a Snapon unit costing hundreds of dollars. But the manufacturer needs to scrub its web site. Possibly the little mini-disc also contains a virus or malware of some time. You shouldn't get a virus or malware on your computer from visiting the company's web site! When the manufacturer cleans up its software, I will revise my rating accordingly--but right now using the company's software can put your computer at risk.

Dies what it is supposed to do

I gave this 5 stars because it does exactly what I want a battery tester to do: it takes the guesswork out. Instead of wondering whether the problem is the battery, the charging system, or something else, this gives me a quick answer without dragging out a bunch of other tools. What I like most: It is easy to use, gives clear readings, and covers the information that actually matters. I like that it can check battery health, state of charge, cranking performance, and charging system performance all in one tool. That makes it useful not just for confirming a bad battery, but also for catching alternator or charging issues before they turn into a bigger headache. Useful features: Another big plus is that it works with a wide range of 12V lead acid batteries and supports plenty of battery rating standards, so it is more versatile than a one-trick tool. It also reads internal resistance, which is a feature I really like because it gives a better picture of battery condition than voltage alone. The fact that it can test on or off the vehicle is also very convenient. Why I bought it: I like having a tool like this around because it can save you from replacing parts blindly. A good battery tester pays for itself quickly the first time it helps you confirm whether a battery is actually bad or still usable. Bonus: Project Farm even did a video on battery testers, and that gave me even more confidence in this one. It was clearly one of the standout options in terms of value and real-world usefulness, which matched what I wanted. Bottom line If you want a battery tester that is easy to use, gives you more than just a basic voltage check, and helps you make better decisions before spending money, this is a great one to own. Easy 5 stars.

Werkt, moet me multimeter niet uithalen en telkens met de settings zitte spele

Update:// 23.09.25 Das Gerät funktioniert tadellos. Nach Rücksprache mit dem Kundendienst, wurde mir problemlos geholfen! Sehr guter Kundenservice!! Ich bin jetzt voll und ganz zufrieden mit dem Gerät. Die Messergebnisse liegen jetzt auch in der Toleranz! Klein, handlich und praktisch. Ideal wäre noch eine kleine Packtasche beizulegen!! ————————————- Alte Bewertung: // 15.09.25 Das Gerät ist eigentlich gut verarbeitet, aber leider versagt es auf ganzer Linie! Die Messergebnisse für die Batterieleistung weichen leider extrem ab. Es wurde mit einem Werkstattgerät verglichen. Entweder habe ich ein defektes Gerät gehabt, oder die Software ist einfach noch nicht richtig ausgereift.