The tandem solar cells have opened up a new era of the manufacture and application of low-cost, large-area and high-efficiency solar cell. The most in-depth and widely used tandem solar cells are mainly amorphous/microcrystalline silicon (α-Si:H/mc-Si:H) silicon-based tandem battery and Ⅲ-Ⅴ compound tandem battery (GaInP/GaAs), but the performance of these two types of tandem batteries will degrade on long-term illumination, which will affect their practical application. Therefore, people have made unremitting efforts to manufacture a high-stability and good-matching tandem battery, which included of improving the manufacturing process and developing the tandem battery of a new material system. As a material with high light absorption coefficient, CIGS shows excellent photoelectric performance. However, CIGS tandem solar cells have a particularly fast attenuation and poor stability in the photoelectric conversion process so it cannot get the theoretical efficiency. In addition, the chalcopyrite structure of the CIGS selenium is difficult to control, which results in poor electrical properties. When the CIGS and Si batteries stacked to form a tandem battery, they are mutually complementary in properties. Si can improve the conductivity of the CIGS and CIGS can increase the wavelength range of the solar absorption of the Si. This review offers a retrospection of the research efforts with respect to the CIGS tandem solar cells, and summarizes the structure, photoelectric properties of the intermediate bonding layers of various tandem batteries such as AZO (ZnO:Al), FTO (SnO2:F), and ITO (In2O3:Sn). The factors affecting the stability of CIGS tandem cells are discussed from the aspects of interlayer, structure and temperature control. We then pay attention to the problems confronting the current state-of-the-art CIGS tandem cells. We have confidence that the CIGS tandem cells have a bright future in the development and innovation of photovoltaic devices with stable and high efficiency. © 2019, Materials Review Magazine. All right reserved.
