Yes, and usually only while it is cold — a lithium cell gives less runtime in the cold and gets it back when it warms up. The one thing that does lasting harm is charging it below freezing.
That is a general property of lithium-ion cells rather than something read off a listing, and it is worth separating into three parts.
Discharging in the cold costs runtime, temporarily. The chemistry slows, the cell delivers less of its capacity, and a tool that ran forty minutes in a warm bathroom may run noticeably less in a cold car. Warm it up and the capacity comes back.
Charging in the cold costs capacity, permanently. Charging a lithium cell below freezing plates lithium onto the anode, and that part does not reverse. If a tool has been in a cold car or an unheated room, let it reach room temperature before putting it on charge. This is the one rule on this page that matters.
Storing cold is not the problem. Cool storage is gentler on a cell than warm storage; it is charging cold, not sitting cold, that does the damage.
What no maker here publishes is an operating or storage temperature range: not one of the 137 products on this site states one, which is why the figure to follow is the one in your own manual if it gives any.
And for the case this question usually comes from — a tool in a suitcase — the things that are published on at least some products here are the ones worth checking: a travel lock, a case, and the voltage rating.
One thing cold does not change: a cell that has genuinely reached the end of its life is not revived by warming it. That is a different failure, and it ends with recycling rather than repair.
Check your own manual before you follow anything here. Temperatures, water ratings and supply voltages differ from model to model, and the maker’s own figures take precedence over anything written on this site. A supply of the wrong voltage is a failure rather than a slow charge, and the figure is printed on the tool — not inferred from a connector that happens to fit.
Last reviewed October 10, 2026