Abstract In order to explore the leaching toxicity of used household alkaline dry batteries, broken rate of 1% and 100% batteries were leached graded through distilled water and mercury, cadmium, lead and zinc were determined respectively. Research results showed that mercury was not detected in the leached solution, but cadmium, lead, zinc could be detected and concentration of zinc in the liquid was higher than integrated wastewater discharge standard. Waste batteries should be recycled positively.