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Lithium-ion battery packs are made by many batteries, and the difficulty in heat transfer can cause many safety issues. It is important to evaluate thermal performance of a battery pack in designing process. Here, a multiscale method combining a pseudo-two-dimensional model of individual battery and three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics is employed to describe heat generation and transfer in a battery pack. The effect of battery arrangement on the thermal performance of battery packs is investigated. We discuss the air-cooling effect of the pack with four battery arrangements which include one square arrangement, one stagger arrangement and two trapezoid arrangements. In addition, the air-cooling strategy is studied by observing temperature distribution of the battery pack. It is found that the square arrangement is the structure with the best air-cooling effect, and the cooling effect is best when the cold air inlet is at the top of the battery pack. We hope that this work can provide theoretical guidance for thermal management of lithium-ion battery packs.