[5] Plumbane has repeatedly been the subject of Dirac–Hartree–Fock relativistic calculation studies, which investigate the stabilities, geometries, and relative energies of hydrides of the formula MH4 or MH2.

[2][6][7] Plumbane is an unstable colorless gas and is the heaviest group IV hydride;[8] and has a tetrahedral (Td) structure with an equilibrium distance between lead and hydrogen of 1.73 Å.

Early studies of PbH4 revealed that the molecule is unstable as compared to its lighter congeners silane, germane, and stannane.

In 1999, plumbane was synthesized from lead(II) nitrate, Pb(NO3)2, and sodium borohydride, NaBH4.

[12] In 2003, Wang and Andrews carefully studied the preparation of PbH4 by laser ablation and additionally identified the infrared (IR) bands.