Recent advances and insights into carbon-based materials synergistically enhancing MXene for supercapacitor, battery, solar cell, and electrocatalytic applications

Ti₃C₂ MXene is a highly conductive 2D transition metal carbide that has gained significant attention for its layered architecture, tunable surface chemistry, and outstanding mechanical properties. These characteristics make it a promising candidate for batteries, supercapacitors, electrocatalysis, and other energy devices. Despite these advantages, practical deployment of MXenes is hindered by oxidation and moisture-driven degradation that impair microstructure and long-term stability, as well as aggregation and self-restacking of multilayer flakes during fabrication, which reduce accessible surface area and impair ion transport. These challenges reduce the active contact area for ion access and reaction sites, leading to sluggish charge transfer, lower capacitance, inferior performance, and diminished efficiency in energy storage and conversion applications. To address these issues, Ti₃C₂ is integrated with various carbon nanostructures and carbon forms, such as quantum dots, graphene, carbon nanotubes, activated carbon, and amorphous carbon, that exploit the synergistic effects of MXenes high pseudocapacitance and electrical conductivity with carbon supports mechanical flexibility, high surface area, and environmental stability. This review summarizes recent advances in MXene/carbon composites engineered to enhance their charge storage and conversion performance across a range of applications, including supercapacitors, batteries, electrocatalysis, solar cells, and CO₂ conversion. The insights provided aim to advance the development of durable, high-performance Ti₃C₂ MXene/carbon composites for sustainable energy technologies.