[13] Its preparation is an entertaining and popular demonstration in chemistry education, to teach topics such as precipitation reactions and stoichiometry.

[19] Lead iodide prepared from cold solutions usually consists of many small hexagonal platelets, giving the yellow precipitate a silky appearance.

The compound is colorless when dissolved in hot water, but crystallizes on cooling as thin but visibly larger bright yellow flakes, that settle slowly through the liquid — a visual effect often described as "golden rain".

[22] Another similar method is to react the two substances in a gel medium, that slows down the diffusion and supports the growing crystal away from the container's walls.

This approach, with a cellulose membrane, was used in September 1988 to study the growth of PbI2 crystals in zero gravity, in an experiment flown on the Space Shuttle Discovery.

[27] Lead iodide is a precursor material in the fabrication of highly efficient Perovskite solar cell.

Typically, a solution of PbI2 in an organic solvent, such as dimethylformamide or dimethylsulfoxide, is applied over a titanium dioxide layer by spin coating.

[12] PbI2 is also used as a high-energy photon detector for gamma-rays and X-rays, due to its wide band gap which ensures low noise operation.

[4] Common material characterization techniques such as electron microscopy can damage samples of lead(II) iodide.