Battery performance prediction using supervised learning: a comparative study

Abstract

Accurate prediction of lithium-ion battery state of charge (SOC) is critical for ensuring safety, durability, and efficient energy management in electric vehicles (EVs). This study presents a systematic comparative analysis of supervised machine learning (ML) models for SOC prediction using the publicly available SiCWell battery dataset. Five regression-based algorithms—Generalized Linear Model (GLM), Gradient Boosting Machine (GBM), Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), Distributed Random Forest (DRF), and Extremely Randomized Trees (XRT)—are implemented within the H2O framework. The analysis considers six physically measurable battery features derived from voltage, resistance, charge throughput, and current direction. Model performance is evaluated using multiple regression metrics, including MAE, MSE, RMSE, RMSLE, residual deviance, and R², under a consistent train–test evaluation protocol. Results indicate that GLM achieves low prediction errors across both training and testing datasets, suggesting that the selected feature set exhibits a strong linear relationship with SOC within the evaluated operating range. However, ensemble models demonstrate higher variance and sensitivity to hyperparameter configurations, leading to reduced generalization performance. Rather than asserting a universally superior model, this study highlights how dataset characteristics, feature linearity, and model complexity influence SOC prediction accuracy. The findings provide insights into selecting appropriate ML models for battery management systems while emphasizing the importance of dataset transparency, interpretability, and generalization analysis.