Research presented in this paper focuses on several factors affecting the performance of direct-methanol fuel cells (DMFCs) under development for either transportation or portable power applications. In particular, we discuss long-term stability of the anode, and crossover of methanol. We report on recent accomplishments in cell performance, fuel utilization, overall conversion efficiency, and lowering Pt loading in DMFCs designed for the potential use in automotive transportation. We describe a method of evaluation of cathode performance based on cathode polarization curves, generated from DMFC data. With this method, we have studied the effect of variation of temperature on DMFC cathode potential. Our results show that Pt-rich DMFC cathodes, operating on ambient air at 60 degreesC, can deliver high performance of more than 0.85 V versus RHE at 0.100 A cm(-2).