Free electricity at a charger sounds great. On public chargers it has all but disappeared, but you still find it locally, and there is almost always a condition attached, and the power is usually too low to build a journey around. Don’t count on it for your daily trips, but take it when you come across it.
Who offers it, and why?
Shops, hotels, restaurants and businesses sometimes install a charger that customers or visitors can use for free. For them it is a service, much like free parking or wifi. The electricity is not free for them. They pay for it and recover the cost elsewhere, for example in their prices or their marketing.
Our data lists no public charger that still charges for free, so you discover such an offer on the spot. The free charging page explains how to charge cheaply instead.
Which conditions will you meet?
Every location handles it differently. These are the usual variants:
- You have to be a customer: make a purchase, book a table or stay the night.
- You may only stay for a limited time.
- You need a card or app from the operator, even though the electricity costs nothing.
- The offer only applies during opening hours.
- It is a temporary promotion that ends on a certain day.
Read the sign at the charger or the explanation in the app before you assume it is free. A charger that gives out electricity with no conditions at all is the exception.
What does a free session actually give you?
Here is a worked example with assumptions you can adjust. Say the charger delivers 7 kW and you stay for 90 minutes while you shop. You add at most 7 × 1.5 = 10.5 kWh. If your car uses 18 kWh per 100 km, that is roughly 58 km of extra range.
Say charging at home costs you 0.30 euro per kWh. That is an assumption, so fill in your own price. The session is then worth about 3 euro. Useful, but it will not change your monthly budget.
The same sum works the other way round. If you drive 8 km out of your way to reach a free charger and 8 km back, you use 16 × 0.18 = 2.9 kWh yourself. That leaves about 7.6 of the 10.5 kWh. A big detour eats the benefit quickly.
Or look at it like this: if you have to spend 15 euro on something you would not otherwise have bought, just to get 3 euro of electricity, it is not free. It is more expensive.
When does it work?
Free charging suits you when you are there anyway. You are doing your shopping, having a bite to eat or have an appointment nearby, and the charger happens to be there. Then it is a bonus with no detour and no extra spending.
It works badly in these situations:
- Your battery is almost empty and you have to move on within the hour.
- You have a fixed departure time and cannot wait for an occupied charger to free up.
- You expect a quick stop. Free chargers often deliver modest power and are too slow for that.
Expect it to be busy
A free charger attracts a lot of users. Expect it to be occupied often, especially when the shop or restaurant is busy. If you come specifically to charge, you may end up waiting. A plan B nearby, such as a paid charger a few minutes’ drive away, means you are not stuck. Read the post on what to do when a charger is occupied for options.
What to do in practice
- Come across a free charger, say at a shop, hotel or business? Then you found it on the spot, because they are not in our data.
- Check on site or in the app whether it is still free and under which conditions.
- Check how many kW the charger delivers and how long you will stay, so you know how much you can add.
- Make sure you can reach your destination or the next charger without that electricity.
- Move your car as soon as you are done. A full car on a free charger blocks it for the next person.
If you mostly pay, your baseline counts
For a predictable cost, charging at home on your own energy contract is still the best route, see home charging. No driveway of your own? Then comparing prices per charging card helps, because paid chargers differ from one another in price.