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How much does it cost to charge an electric car overnight?

Work out what it costs to charge an electric car at home — per top-up, per year and per 100 miles or kilometres, including the energy lost on the way into the battery.

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Using the UK average of 26.32p/kWh — Ofgem, 1 October to 31 December 2026.

The way most people actually charge. On an off-peak or EV tariff this is where home charging gets genuinely cheap — put your night rate in the tariff box to see it.

Your car
kWh
The usable figure, not the gross one — manufacturers quote both, and a few kWh are always held back to protect the pack.
kWh/100 mi
Real-world consumption, which is usually worse than the official figure and noticeably worse in winter. Leave at 0 if you would rather skip the distance figures.
The charge
%
%
80% is the usual stopping point: charging slows sharply above it, and sitting at 100% is harder on the battery.
Your tariff
p/kWh
If you charge overnight on an EV or off-peak tariff, use that rate — it is often a fraction of the standard one, and it is the single biggest lever on this answer.
%
Energy that never reaches the battery. Home AC charging typically loses 8–12% to the onboard charger, the cable and keeping the pack at temperature.
This top-up costs £7.02
Charging cost per year £1,460
Cost per 100 mi £8.48
Range added (mi) 83
A full charge would cost £17.55
Drawn from the wall 26.67 kWh

Common cases

What drives the cost

This is how charging actually happens for most owners: plugged in on arrival, topped up from somewhere in the middle of the battery, unplugged in the morning. It is also the case where home charging is at its cheapest, because the whole session falls inside the off-peak window.

The gap is large enough to be worth arranging your life around. Dedicated EV and off-peak tariffs commonly price night units at a third or less of the day rate, and a car that only ever charges between midnight and five in the morning captures all of it. Put your night rate into the tariff field rather than your average one, or this page will overstate the cost substantially.

How this is worked out

Charging cost is the energy you put in multiplied by your electricity rate — but the energy you put in is not the same as the energy that reaches the battery. Some is lost in the car's onboard charger, the cable and keeping the pack at temperature, and your meter counts all of it. So a 60 kWh battery taken from 20% to 80% needs 36 kWh at the battery, but around 40 kWh from the wall at a typical 10% loss.

What this assumes

  • Charging losses of around 10%, which is typical for home AC charging. A slow 3-pin plug is worse, a wall box on a warm day is better, and cold weather is worse again.
  • One flat electricity rate. If you charge on an off-peak or EV tariff, the rate you enter matters far more than anything else on this page — overnight rates are often a third of the standard one.
  • Real-world energy use, not the official test figure. Winter, motorway speeds and a full car all push consumption up, often by 20–30%.
  • Home charging only. Public rapid charging typically costs several times as much per kWh.

Questions

Do I need a special tariff to charge overnight cheaply?

To get the large discount, yes — you need a tariff with a genuine off-peak rate, and most require a smart meter. Charging overnight on a flat tariff is no cheaper than charging at noon.

Will a standard three-pin plug be enough overnight?

For a top-up like this, usually. A three-pin plug delivers roughly 2.3 kW, so about 16 kWh over seven hours — enough for a 40–80% fill on a mid-size car, but not enough to recover a nearly empty battery before morning. It is also the least efficient way to charge.

Why is the wall figure higher than the battery figure?

Because charging is not perfectly efficient. The car's onboard charger converts AC from your house into DC for the battery, and that conversion, the cable and the battery's own thermal management all take a share. Your meter bills what left the wall, so that is what this calculates.

Why does it charge to 80% rather than 100%?

Because that is what most people do with a nickel-based battery. Charging slows sharply in the last 20%, and an NMC or NCA pack left sitting at 100% degrades faster. LFP packs are the exception and are meant to be filled — if your car has one, its own page here says so. Set both fields to whatever you actually do; there is a full-charge preset if you want the other number.

Should I use my normal rate or my EV tariff?

Your EV or off-peak rate, if you have one and you charge overnight. It is by far the biggest lever here: the same car on the same mileage can cost two or three times more on a standard rate than on a dedicated overnight one.

Does this cover public charging?

No. This is home charging. Public rapid chargers are priced per kWh at a much higher rate, and often add a connection fee, so the cost per mile can be several times what you see here.

Related tools

Sources

Rates from Ofgem for 1 October to 31 December 2026. Last reviewed 14 October 2026.