How you charge your battery can make or break your Tesla experience. There is no need to get anxious about your range, but you do need to plan ahead, just as you would with your old fossil fuel car. In some ways, battery charging is not as convenient, since depending on your charging setup, it can take hours to fully charge, but being able to charge at home while you sleep makes it much more convenient than having to go to the gas station.
That doesn’t necessarily mean that you absolutely have to have the most powerful charger in your garage. Your needs will vary based on your daily driving patterns, how often you have unexpected or out of the ordinary road trips, and even the climate in your region.
Tesla stopped including the Mobile Connector on April 17, 2022, so you will need to buy a connector to plug in to your car. The Mobile Connector has a removable adapter which attaches to the Mobile Connector and plugs into your outlet. The other end plugs into your Tesla. It comes with a 20′ cable, so make sure it can reach from the nearest plug to the back-left corner of the car. You can buy the Mobile Connector with a 120v adapter and a 14-50 adapter from Tesla.com for $250. So how much power do you really need?
You want to make sure you can recover your range for a typical day of driving during your overnight hours. Most people park their cars overnight for 10-12 hours at minimum.
Calculator: How long will it take to charge up?
Calculator: How much will my electricity bill go up?
120 volt outlet
If you have a very short commute in the neighborhood, or you are just going to the grocery store and local errands, you may be fine plugging into a standard 120 volt, 15 amp outlet with the Mobile Connector and adapter. This is, by far, the simplest and cheapest option. You probably already have an outlet in your garage so there is no installation costs.
With a 12 hour overnight charge, you can recover 24 miles (38 km) overnight. If you only rarely drive longer distances, you can use a local supercharger for a top-up if needed from time to time this might be enough for you.
Keep in mind, if you live in an area with cold winter temperatures, the cold weather penalty is more severe at 120 volts because warming the battery for charging will take a greater portion of the available energy.
The 120 volt outlet is the simplest to implement, and all you need is the mobile connector, but with the slow rate of charging, it is really only useful for people that drive very little, and live in warmer climates (see below).
240 volt outlet
The 120v setup is the simplest, but you might need faster charging rates to recover the miles you drive in a typical day. The Nema 14-50 adapter comes with the Mobile Connector, and is the most common 240v setup.
If you are lucky enough to already have a 240 volt outlet in your garage for a dryer, welder or power tools, you can possibly use that. If it is running 30 or 50 amps, that will still be much faster than the 120 volt option, and will be sufficient for most needs. Simply purchase the appropriate adapter, and use it with the mobile charger that came with your car.
Most likely though, you will need to have an outlet installed. The most common solution for EV owners is to have an electrician install a NEMA 14-50 outlet in your garage and use the adapter that comes with the Mobile Connector. While there are many other options, a NEMA 14-50 outlet is the most common option for EV use – for Tesla, as well as third-party chargers for other EV automobiles. Your electrician will need to run a thick, 6 gauge cable from the outlet location in your garage to your electrical panel with a dedicated 50 amp circuit breaker. Your cost will depend heavily on the length of that cable, and how complicated it is to run to your panel.
If your house only has 60 or 100 amp service, your electrician may need to upgrade your main electrical panel and the house wiring which can add significantly to the cost.
Once the outlet is installed and you have the appropriate adapter for your mobile connector, you can charge at up to 32 amps and recover 360 miles (580 km) overnight with a 12 hour charge. For the current Model X, 3 or Y, that means no matter how much you drive the car during the day, you’ll be able to get to a full charge overnight. The Model S Long Range and Plaid+ will get pretty close to a full charge overnight even if you drive the full capacity of the battery (Very few people use up their full capacity every day. That is usually for Taxi/Uber drivers).
The biggest advantage to this setup is the Nema 14-50 has become the standard for EV’s. Most 3rd party EVSE’s can plug into this outlet, so if a friend visits, they can plug in their own EVSE to that outlet. It also becomes a selling feature for your house to have an EV outlet in the garage.
The Mobile Connector with a NEMA 14-50 outlet is the most common charging setup for Tesla owners. It comes with the 14-50 adapter, plus you’ll add the cost of an electrician to install the outlet, but for most people it will fully charge the car overnight.
Tesla High Powered Wall Connector
The Tesla High Powered Wall Connector (sometimes referred to as HPWC or just “Wall Connector”) is the highest power option for home use. You can purchase it from Tesla for $420. You’ll need to get an electrician to hardwire the charger directly to a 6 gauge cable on a 60 amp circuit.
If you have a Long Range or Performance model, you will now be able to charge a little bit faster, adding 528 miles (849 km) in a 12 hour charge. Of course, your Tesla can’t hold that much charge, so a current Long Range Model X, 3, or Y would be capable of going from completely empty to a full charge in just 8 hours. A Long Range Model S could still do a full charge in 12 hours. If you have an Standard Range RWD Model 3, it is limited to 32amps of charging, so these speeds will be the same as the NEMA 14-50 above.
Aside from the slightly faster charging speed, the biggest advantage comes if you will be charging outdoors in a driveway for security. While both the Wall Connector and Mobile Connector are safe for use in rain or snow, the Wall Connector is bolted to the wall or post, so there is less of a worry about it getting stolen. You can also limit its use to a specific car, so no one else can plug in and get a free charge.
Also see: Let’s Talk About the Wall Connector
The Wall Connector is the most expensive option for home charging. It will cost $420 to buy the Connector, plus the cost of an electrician to hardwire it to your house wiring. It too, will be able to recharge fully overnight.
Range Caveats
All of these numbers are theoretical, however in normal circumstances, they are not far off. There are a few other things to consider.
For Li-Ion batteries, Tesla does not recommend charging your battery to 100%, or letting it fall to 0% on a regular basis, as that can have a serious impact on the battery health. Once in a while and for short periods of time, this is fine, but you really don’t want to make a habit of this. Ideally, you’ll want to keep it between 20% and 80% charge. If you have a newer Standard Range car with an LFP battery, and it can and should be charged to 100%.
Also consider your climate. Your battery range will start to be affected anywhere below 50F (10C), with more impact the colder it gets. In winter weather below freezing, you can expect a 30% drop in range. Your charging speeds will also be affected, as your car will need to use some of the incoming power to warm up the battery so that it can charge. Be sure to allow some breathing space in your charging routine. Using a 120v charging setup below freezing will have trouble maintaining the battery temperature, let alone adding a charge.
If you are looking at these numbers and getting nervous about your range, don’t be. The average American’s commute is only 30 miles roundtrip. Even if you are driving 100 or 150 miles per day, a NEMA 14-50 will be fine for most needs. Many people are concerned that EVs take a long time to charge compared to filling a gas tank, and that is true, but doing that filling at home while you sleep means that you actually spend significantly less time filling up than if you had to make a trip to the gas station. You simply wake up every morning to a full tank!
