Conjugated microporous polymer electrodes for supercapacitors: recent progress, key challenges, and future directions

Conjugated Microporous Polymers (CMPs) have shown great potential as a class of materials for supercapacitor electrodes, offering a distinctive blend of extensive surface area, tunable porosity, redox activity, and chemical stability. This review thoroughly explores the role of CMPs in advancing supercapacitor technology, focusing on their structural and chemical characteristics, energy storage mechanisms, and recent advancements in material design and device engineering. We highlight the synergistic integration of CMPs with carbon-based nanomaterials, metal oxides, and conductive polymers to create hybrid and composite systems that enhance conductivity and electrochemical performance. Recent studies demonstrate significant improvements in essential performance indicators, including mass-based capacitance, energy storage capacity, power output efficiency, and cycling stability, positioning CMPs as competitive alternatives to traditional carbon-based materials like activated carbon as well as graphene. Although progress has been made, issues with scalability, conductivity, and long-term stability are still major challenges, requiring further research and innovation. This review also explores future directions, emphasizing the potential of CMPs in flexible, wearable, and solid-state supercapacitors, as well as their integration into hybrid energy systems. By addressing current limitations and leveraging emerging trends, CMP-based supercapacitors hold immense promise for enabling the next generation of highly durable, sustainable, and efficient energy storage systems. This review seeks to inspire future research as well as collaboration in this sector, facilitating transformative advances in energy storage systems.