I charge at home and let it charge up to 70%. We rarely drive enough where it’s not back up to 70% the next day.
this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2023
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Electric Vehicles including hybrids and plug-ins
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I charge on L1 (AC at ~1800W) at home most of the time, when it goes below 40% I charge to 80%. I don't drive much so I have to plug it in about once a week. I charge to 100% before a long trip and top up with fast DC charging to complete the trip
yeah i charge up to 80%, but not necessarily every night. if it drops below 60% or so i’ll plug it back in.
I am not yet an EV owner, but I have done some research into this question, it would appear that most brands batteries are actually pretty good with 10-20% degradation in 10 years good. So odds are you won't charge enough to really affect it. I plan on charging it like I do my phone, so letting it get to 20% after like a few days of driving, then full charge overnight. My understanding is the battery degrades due to actual charge cycles, so constant charging in theory is more strenuous on the battery. I doubt my "optimizations" will result in more than 2 or 3 % better battery performance, if that.
I’d love to hear what others do, too. I hope to drive my Mach-E into the ground so would love to preserve the life of my battery as best I can. I currently limit to 90% SoC but maybe I should reduce to 80%? I drive very little (less than 15 mile round trip for work), but drive much more on weekends. Should I even limit how often I charge to maybe once a week from home?
I think the 20-90% range is ideal for stress on the battery cells. Everyone I’ve talked to suggest “ABC” (Always Be Charging). When I’m topped up to 80%, my car doesn’t charge, but it does draw some current from the wall for load balancing, temperature control, etc. But I don’t think that negatively impacts the batteries.
I drive a PHEV (Volt Gen. 2, 2018) where I need the full range, depending on weather, so I charge to full every night at 240V/20A. I have a Grizzl-E at home set to the lowest-current dip switch since it's more efficient and generates less heat that way. L2 is plenty fast enough overnight, so it hasn't been an issue. I used to just use L1, but it was annoying shuffling plugs in the garage when I wanted to do woodworking, so we had another circuit put in (and we therefore went with L2).
Typically charge to 90% after we get down between 10-30%.
It helps to know the type of car. I charge my F150L to 85% most of the time. Ford recommends 90% and sets that as the limit from the factory.