A definitive objective of materials utilized in optoelectronic applications ought to be founded on the “triple-E” terms: financially
economical, vitality
effective and naturally
efficient. In spite of their very great execution in lead halide perovskite based solar cells with efficiencies reached 24.2% and the rising application for lasers [
1], light-radiating diodes (LEDs) [
2], and field-impact light-producing transistors (FETs) [
3], organic−inorganic lead halide perovskites experience the ill effects of high substance of lethal, contaminating, and bioaccumulative Pb, which may in the end hamper their commercialization. Progressively, It turn out to be accordingly of essential significance to consider and create alternative classes of lead free halide double perovskites for various optoelectronic applications [
4]. The need of creating practical advances dependent on ecologically neighborly, earth-inexhaustible, and financially savvy materials normally drives the consideration toward the change metals, where especially appealing metals (e.g., Fe
2+, Cu
2+, Zn
2+) and post transition elements [
5,
6]. For example, Tin [
7,
8,
9], Rubidium [
10,
11], Indium-Silver [
12,
13], Titanium [
14], Bismuth and Silver-Bismuth [
12,
15,
16,
17,
18] and Copper [
19] based perovskites have been found as potential choices to toxic perovskites. Thanks to their rich science, their utilization may tremendously broaden engineered courses of new halide double perovskites for photovoltaic and light-radiating applications enhancing the tunability of the material. Moreover, the discovery of lead-free double perovskites provides a feasible way of searching for air-stable and environmentally benign solar cell absorbers [
6,
19,
20,
21,
22,
23,
24,
25]. Since the 1970s, a large number of double perovskites (which are well known as elpasolites) with nominal chemical compositions of A
2M
IM
IIIX
6 (A and M
I = Li
+, Na
+, K
+, Rb
+, Cs
+, Ag
+, Tl
+, etc., M
III = Bi
3+, Al
3+, Ln
3+, Ga
3+, Fe
3+, etc., and X = F, Cl, Br, or I) have been initially reported as ferroelectric materials [
26,
27]. However, the
Lead and Tin free all-inorganic halide double perovskite solar cell power conversion efficiency is far smaller than the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of lead based perovskite solar cells. The reason why the
Lead and Tin free all-inorganic halide double perovskites’ PCE improvement is too slow compared to lead halide perovskites PCE become great concern and active research direction for the halide double perovskite scientific community. In conjunction with the advancement of halide double perovskite solar cells, interesting concepts covering cationic exchange, doping and alloying for engineering the electronic structure of double perovskites [
28], and its crystal structure, preparation approaches, physicochemical properties and material various applications [
29], [
6,
24] various strategies such as hetero-substitution of Pb to form quaternary halide double perovskites [
5], and a strategy for achieving small bandgaps in this family of materials [
30]. Moreover, the PCE of single junction lead based perovskite is now 24.2% [
31], 25.2% [
32] and 29.15% [
33] for textured monolithic perovskite/silicon tandem solar cell, but the record for lead free all inorganic cesium tin-germanium triiodide (CsSn
0.5Ge
0.5I
3) solid-solution perovskite is 7.11% [
34]. According to the simulation results reported, CsSn
0.5Ge0
.5I
3 perovskite material can have power conversion efficiency of 18.79% [
35] and 24.63% [
36]. Furthermore, CsSn
0.5Ge
0.5I
3/FASnI
3 device architecture is reported with simulated power conversion efficiency of 31.58% [
37]. This indicates that CsSn
0.5Ge
0.5I
3/FASnI
3 device is promising device for high performance lead free solar cells.
This efficiency can be achieved if encapsulation mechanisms, fabrication procedures and material parameters such as defect density, layer thickness, operating temperature, electron affinity potential energy are well optimized during experiment. Moreover, tin based perovskite solar cells have promising efficiency next to lead based perovskite solar cells, devices made of Tin based perovskite materials exhibit insufficient stability [
38] and it contains intrinsically deep defects that are detrimental to the perovskite solar cell performance [
39]. Even the most stable CsSn
0.5Ge
0.5I
3 based perovskite solar cell showed 10% decay in efficiency after 500 h of con- tinuous operation in N
2 atmosphere under one-sun illumination [
34]. Hence, to overcome the toxicity of lead and insufficient stability of Tin, efforts to find alternative perovskite materials, which are earth-abundant, non-toxic, stable and biocompatible, are still in progress.
Based on these needs, lead and tin free all-inorganic solar cells such as Cs
2AgBiBr
6 and Cs
2TiBr
6 have been reported recently. The record for Cs
2AgBiBr
6, and Cs
2TiBr
6 lead and tin free all-inorganic halide double perovskite solar cell are 2.5% [
40] (current report is 2.81% [
41] with photoelectronic conversion efficiency of hydrogenated Cs
2AgBiBr
6 perovskite solar cell of 6.37% [
42]) and 3.3% [
43], respectively, which are far less than 24.2% for single junction lead based halide perovskite solar cells and 29.15% for tandom solar cell. Consequently, the progress is yet too slow to reach the lead halide perovskite solar cells. From theoretical perspective, simulation results reported that Cs
2TiBr
6 has achieved 11.49 % power conversion efficiency [
44]. This is promising to manufacture practical lead free double halide perovskite solar cell. More recently, an Au/CuSbS2/Cs
2TiBr
6/CdS/TCO configuration has achieved power conversion efficiency of 23.77% as reported by simulated results [
45]. This is again more promising result in this field. Unless the real and bottleneck challenges and bottleneck solutions are clearly identified to be solved, Cs
2AgBiBr
6 and Cs
2TiBr
6 based halide double perovskite solar cell will not be able to be first alternative solar cell to replace the lead halide perovskite solar cells. Thus, this review article is designed to identify the challenges and possible solutions for power conversion efficiency improvement of halide double perovskite solar cells that will be considered as research roadmap for performance improvements in this field. Hence, this is a comprehensive review that concisely reviews the modification strategies from CH
3NH
3PbI
3 into many halide double perovskites materials, origin of electronic and optical properties variations, key challenges and areas of research for possible solutions and performance improvement strategies of both Lead and Tin free all-inorganic halide double perovskite solar cells. Moreover, this will provide a new perspective and research roadmap for performance improvement to the scientific community and research industries.