UV curing offers advantages such as speed, environmental friendliness, and high wear resistance and hardness. However, its high polymer chain cross-linking density results in poor flexibility, a persistent challenge for UV-cured materials. In practical applications, while demanding high wear resistance, hardness, and strength, materials also need good flexibility to meet diverse application requirements. These include 3D printed products, dental prosthetics, wear-resistant coatings for mobile phones, architectural coatings, polymer protective coatings, and inkjet inks. Good flexibility is crucial to prevent cracking during application, achieving both protective and decorative effects.
In 2026, the UV industry must pay close attention to the high weather resistance of UV materials. Only by transitioning from indoor to outdoor applications can UV curing technology achieve a qualitative leap and a significant increase in quantity.
The most pressing issue for UV outdoor applications is achieving high weather resistance, ensuring lifespan, and maintaining long-term material performance. The development of new raw materials, the formulation of specialized products, and the application of novel additives will accelerate the adoption of UV products in outdoor applications such as building exterior decoration, road-related products, automotive coatings, outdoor tanks, and bridge corrosion protection.
Looking ahead to 2026, with increasingly stringent national environmental requirements and a growing understanding of UV technology among end-users, UV technology will experience further rapid development. UV industry professionals should focus on:
Actively participating in UV applications in the new energy vehicle sector, such as UV insulation materials, UV adhesives, UV decorative materials, and UV thermal insulation materials.
Accelerating the exploration of UV applications in high-end fields such as aerospace, microelectronics, and displays, such as photoresists, high and low refractive index materials, high-temperature resistant materials, anti-counterfeiting coatings, and encapsulation materials.
Closely monitoring the development of EB (e-book) curing and exploring its applications in roll-to-roll steel coating, printing, roll-to-roll polymer film coating, and food packaging.
Expanding UV applications in bio-repair, medical materials, and hygiene materials.
The application of cationic photocuring will develop rapidly, and new cationic photoinitiators, monomers, and resins will see significant growth.
Following these anticipated technological trends, Huizheng Information has compiled some key developments in the UV-curable materials field for 2025 to help industry professionals better understand the current situation.
1. Product Breakthrough Addressing Toughness Bottlenecks
Chase’s HumiSeal launched UV550, a UV-curable coating material, in 2025. The core technology of this product introduces the concept of “acrylate elastomers,” meaning that while maintaining high hardness and high wear resistance, it achieves better flexibility and crack resistance. According to public reports, this product has undergone over 1000 extreme thermal shock cycles and has already begun to be used in high-end fields such as new energy vehicle circuit boards and consumer electronics.
2. Patent-Level Breakthrough Overcoming Weather Resistance Bottlenecks
In 2025, Shanghai Junzilan New Materials Co., Ltd., a Chinese company, made significant progress in “UV-cured, yellowing-resistant, high-hardness, glossy clear topcoat.” After curing, it forms a highly cross-linked film with a hardness ≥2H and meets the national Class 1 standard for yellowing resistance. This product can be used as a clear topcoat for doors, windows, and outdoor furniture, providing a high-gloss, high-hardness decorative effect while giving the substrate long-lasting UV protection, effectively delaying outdoor aging.
3. Integrated Solutions for Outdoor Applications
In 2025, Nanjing University of Technology successfully developed a self-cleaning UV-curable transparent heat-insulating coating, marking a new stage in the UV industry where interdisciplinary material innovation is used to solve systemic application challenges. This technology, by introducing nano-functional materials (such as ATO to improve dispersibility) and multifunctional acrylic monomers, comprehensively achieves resistance to yellowing, water resistance, weather resistance, heat insulation, and self-cleaning properties while maintaining high light transmittance.
4. UV Insulating Coating Replaces PET Blue Film
In April 2025, SKSHU Paint disclosed its invention patent for “UV-based battery insulating coating and its preparation method,” overcoming the pain points of traditional power battery cell insulation solutions, such as poor adhesion and easy peeling of PET blue film, and low curing efficiency of powder coatings. It uses a specially modified polyurethane acrylate resin, combined with a photoinitiator system specifically tuned for the 395nm wavelength, enabling the cured coating to simultaneously achieve excellent adhesion strength, substrate adhesion, electrical insulation, voltage resistance, and impact toughness. This coating can be applied using inkjet printing and other processes, forming a uniform film and achieving rapid curing, combining efficient application, low odor, low VOC, and overall cost advantages.
Concurrently, Sherwin-Williams launched a commercial UV-curable coating solution, leveraging its rapid curing and low VOC characteristics to form a high-performance protective coating on the battery surface. The key breakthrough of this solution lies in significantly improving the coating’s dielectric strength, adhesion, and the reliability of its bonding with the battery casing, thus better meeting the safety requirements of high-voltage platforms. Simultaneously, the second-level curing characteristic greatly improves production efficiency, supporting large-scale automated manufacturing.
5. Radiation-Curable Powder Coatings Enter Research Phase
In October 2025, the project “Development of Key Technologies for Radiation-Curable Powder Coatings for Power Battery Cell Coatings,” led by Henan University of Technology in collaboration with the Henan Academy of Sciences and enterprises, received provincial-level research funding. This project targets radiation-curable powder coating technology, which is more advanced than traditional UV liquid coatings. Its research goal is to overcome the shortcomings of existing materials and develop a new generation of coating materials that possess excellent insulation and adhesion while meeting the requirements of future higher voltage platforms, representing a direction for the field towards more environmentally friendly, more efficient, and higher-performance future technologies.
6. On-Site Solutions for Outdoor Repairs
In 2025, a key patent entitled “A UV-LED Cured Repair Paint.” This technology aims to systematically overcome the core shortcomings of traditional solvent-based repair paints, such as slow curing and environmental unfriendliness, as well as the weak adhesion and insufficient long-term protective performance of ordinary UV coatings on complex rusted substrates. It achieves excellent adhesion to exposed steel, rusted surfaces, and old paint films, enabling ultra-fast curing in seconds to minutes, with salt spray resistance exceeding 500 hours, while also possessing good mechanical properties and solvent-free environmental characteristics. This provides an efficient and durable on-site repair solution for outdoor steel structures such as bridges and ships.
7. Achieving High-End Home Decoration Effects
In 2025, Carpoly Furniture Coatings launched a UV gloss coating solution for commonly used custom substrates such as engineered wood veneer and melamine boards. The UV gloss coating optically enhances and optimizes the texture of the substrate surface, significantly improving visual appeal. Simultaneously, the high-crosslink density paint film formed by UV curing endows the coating with high hardness, excellent weather resistance, scratch resistance, and long-lasting color retention.
8. Safety-Grade Bonding Achieved in Medical Devices
In 2025, Chenlink launched its 3007 series of medical UV adhesives, precisely addressing the industry pain points of adhesive layer embrittlement and penetration deformation in the bonding of flexible plastics such as TPU catheters. This marked a breakthrough in the localization of UV curing technology in the high-end medical device manufacturing field. The product exhibits excellent and stable bonding strength to various flexible materials such as TPU/PE/PP and has passed the stringent 10993 biocompatibility certification, solidifying the foundation of medical safety. This not only strongly promotes the import substitution process of domestically produced high-end medical adhesives but also signifies that UV technology has been deeply integrated into medical manufacturing scenarios with extremely high requirements for safety and reliability.
From medical UV adhesives that solve the problem of flexible bonding, to high-weather-resistant coatings and self-cleaning solutions that withstand harsh outdoor environments, and to insulating materials that ensure the safety of new energy vehicles, the UV/EB curing materials industry in 2026 is advancing in tandem along the four directions pointed out by Nie Jun: improved toughness, high weather resistance, boundary expansion, and high-end manufacturing. Together, they form a clear picture of industrial upgrading, showing that UV/EB curing technology is moving from the laboratory to industrialization, from indoor to outdoor, and from single functions to integrated solutions. This marks the industry’s shift from technology-driven to a new stage of cross-domain integration and innovation oriented towards end-user needs.
Post time: Jan-29-2026
