What's your charging routine?
What's your charging routine?
Author
Discussion

underwhelmist

Original Poster:

1,964 posts

152 months

Tuesday 29th July
quotequote all
It's a noob question, but for those who have home chargers - do you plug in every night?

I've owned my 38kWh Ioniq for about a month and have been plugging in when it gets down to around 20%, charging to 80%. This has been every other day, possibly every three days.

After a nightmare journey back from north London on Sunday (bad planning on my part, less range than indicated on the motorway, closed charger locations, multiple vandalised chargers) where we finally rolled up to a working charger with 3% remaining, I'm tempted to plug in every night to keep it as close to 80% (I realise this may not be a rational response!) Is this sensible/worth it, or is it harmful for the battery to frequently top up to 80%?

BTW I hope the bds who stole the cables from the vandalised chargers in Bromsgrove (2 locations, 7 chargers in total) get bloody electrocuted the next time they try it.

flight147z

1,280 posts

147 months

Tuesday 29th July
quotequote all
Why are you not charging it to 100%...?

Discombobulate

5,682 posts

204 months

Tuesday 29th July
quotequote all
underwhelmist said:
It's a noob question, but for those who have home chargers - do you plug in every night?

I've owned my 38kWh Ioniq for about a month and have been plugging in when it gets down to around 20%, charging to 80%. This has been every other day, possibly every three days.

After a nightmare journey back from north London on Sunday (bad planning on my part, less range than indicated on the motorway, closed charger locations, multiple vandalised chargers) where we finally rolled up to a working charger with 3% remaining, I'm tempted to plug in every night to keep it as close to 80% (I realise this may not be a rational response!) Is this sensible/worth it, or is it harmful for the battery to frequently top up to 80%?

BTW I hope the bds who stole the cables from the vandalised chargers in Bromsgrove (2 locations, 7 chargers in total) get bloody electrocuted the next time they try it.
Start every day with 80%. No problem. At all.
Or even a 100% on weekdays if commuting every day.
Our BMW has been charged to 100% every time its been plugged in since new (3 years and 30k miles) and no noticeable change in range.

Edited by Discombobulate on Tuesday 29th July 23:07

Mars

9,681 posts

232 months

Tuesday 29th July
quotequote all
I lease mine, so I don't care about the battery. I put mine on charge whenever I get home, and leave it until it's at 100%. I've had it for a bit over 2 years and have only lost about 10 miles from its max-declared range (222 down to 212).

Mine charges from the granny charger only but I don't use it everyday. This time of year I plug it in only during the day so that it charges off my solar panels.

Danm1les

959 posts

158 months

Tuesday 29th July
quotequote all
We have 2 ev’s, regardless of SOC, one of them is always plugged in over night, even if it’s for a little top up.

PetrolHeadInRecovery

335 posts

33 months

Tuesday 29th July
quotequote all
underwhelmist said:
It's a noob question, but for those who have home chargers - do you plug in every night?

I've owned my 38kWh Ioniq for about a month and have been plugging in when it gets down to around 20%, charging to 80%. This has been every other day, possibly every three days.

After a nightmare journey back from north London on Sunday (bad planning on my part, less range than indicated on the motorway, closed charger locations, multiple vandalised chargers) where we finally rolled up to a working charger with 3% remaining, I'm tempted to plug in every night to keep it as close to 80% (I realise this may not be a rational response!) Is this sensible/worth it, or is it harmful for the battery to frequently top up to 80%?

BTW I hope the bds who stole the cables from the vandalised chargers in Bromsgrove (2 locations, 7 chargers in total) get bloody electrocuted the next time they try it.
I'd keep the battery close to 80% and not worry too much about it, and I occasionally pretend to be a rational being. smile

I've understood that the closer you are to 50% (or 40%, depending a bit on the source), the better. So 80% should be as good as 20%.

For what it is worth, the Ioniq 5 manual recommends topping up to 100% if the SoC has dropped below 20% to help the battery management system balance the cells. The manual doesn't say anything about keeping the charge at 100% for extended periods of time (days/weeks), but other sources do. But I don't think that occasionally charging to 100% before the daily commute should cause any measurable wear.

We usually start charging when running errands (no home charging) at around 40-45% SoC until we end up somewhere around 80-85%. Unless we realise we have ignored the "occasional 100% charge" rule for a month or two (or we're on a road trip). Haven't checked the battery health, but there's no reduction of range over 70,000km.

Bonefish Blues

33,022 posts

241 months

Tuesday 29th July
quotequote all
Come home. Plug in with granny. i3s are dead simple - we suit each other smile

underwhelmist

Original Poster:

1,964 posts

152 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
flight147z said:
Why are you not charging it to 100%...?
Because I've bought it, not leasing, and the plan is to keep it for a long time. I've read that always charging to 100% can harm battery longevity. I did charge to 100% before leaving for the big smoke, it was only later that day that my incompetence kicked in!

Discombobulate said:
Start every day with 80%. No problem. At all.
Or even a 100% on weekdays if commuting every day.
Our BMW has been charged to 100% every time its been plugged in since new (3 years and 30k miles) and no noticeable change in range.

Edited by Discombobulate on Tuesday 29th July 23:07
Good to know, thank you.

Danm1les said:
We have 2 ev s, regardless of SOC, one of them is always plugged in over night, even if it s for a little top up.
I think this might be the way.

PetrolHeadInRecovery said:
I'd keep the battery close to 80% and not worry too much about it, and I occasionally pretend to be a rational being. smile

I've understood that the closer you are to 50% (or 40%, depending a bit on the source), the better. So 80% should be as good as 20%.

For what it is worth, the Ioniq 5 manual recommends topping up to 100% if the SoC has dropped below 20% to help the battery management system balance the cells. The manual doesn't say anything about keeping the charge at 100% for extended periods of time (days/weeks), but other sources do. But I don't think that occasionally charging to 100% before the daily commute should cause any measurable wear.

We usually start charging when running errands (no home charging) at around 40-45% SoC until we end up somewhere around 80-85%. Unless we realise we have ignored the "occasional 100% charge" rule for a month or two (or we're on a road trip). Haven't checked the battery health, but there's no reduction of range over 70,000km.
Yeah I've read a lot about the 20%-80% rule but I don't know if it's still applicable with more recent batteries and management systems (the car is three years old, so not bang up to date, but still). I haven't seen any mention of charging to 100% occasionally in my manual but I'll take another look.

Thanks all for the responses, I think I'll get in the habit of topping up to 80% every night even though I'm probably only using 15% on normal commuting days.

edit: Shout out to the staff (and a few regulars) at the Swan in Fairfield, Bromsgrove, location of a bunch of lobotomised chargers. Even though they'd officially closed they let us in and advised us where to find a working charger. We'll be back for lunch!


Edited by underwhelmist on Wednesday 30th July 00:25

plfrench

3,831 posts

286 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
We typically plug both in every night and let them charge up to 100%. ID3 is on 42k miles and 22 months old and still managed 271 miles at the weekend against a WLTP of 266, so don’t think range has been adversely affected by doing this.

TheRainMaker

7,266 posts

260 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
We have two EVs, not a chance we charge one everynight, that would turn into a massive pain the arse.

The Polestar is charged once a week (200 mile range), and the i3 probably twice a week, once at home and once at work (140 mile range).

Both charged to 100% everytime, I really couldnt give a monkeys about the life span of the car, it won't be my problem whistle

GT6k

921 posts

180 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
Just plug in every day and stop worrying.

speciald

122 posts

189 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
I have free charging at work so charge it to 100% when I am there.

If I need to charge at home I only charge it enough for my journey. Currently at 30% battery but don't need the car today, probably be at about 20% by the time I get to the office in the morning.

kambites

70,015 posts

239 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
We plug in overnight if the car is below about 50%, with the car set to stop at 80%. In practice that generally means a couple of times a week for us.

If we have a long trip then next day we'll set the car to charge to 100%, obviously.

gmaz

4,961 posts

228 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
kambites said:
We plug in overnight if the car is below about 50%, with the car set to stop at 80%. In practice that generally means a couple of times a week for us.

If we have a long trip then next day we'll set the car to charge to 100%, obviously.
Exactly the same for me.

the cueball

1,585 posts

73 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
I tend to charge to 100% on a Monday.

That lasts me all week.

Don't really care about all this 80% ste... I've never filled a car with fuel to 80%, not going to start messing about now.


kambites

70,015 posts

239 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
I tend to think of charging to 100% as analogous to revving a petrol to the redline. Something I'll happily do when there's a reason to but I'd expect doing so all the time to shorten the life of the car.

Zetec-S

6,512 posts

111 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
kambites said:
We plug in overnight if the car is below about 50%, with the car set to stop at 80%. In practice that generally means a couple of times a week for us.

If we have a long trip then next day we'll set the car to charge to 100%, obviously.
We've only had ours for a few weeks, but so far it's the same for us, usually means just once a week at the moment.

My (albeit limited) understanding is that it is proportionally more expensive to get that final 80-100% charge which is why I won't bother unless needed.

Discombobulate

5,682 posts

204 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
Zetec-S said:
We've only had ours for a few weeks, but so far it's the same for us, usually means just once a week at the moment.

My (albeit limited) understanding is that it is proportionally more expensive to get that final 80-100% charge which is why I won't bother unless needed.
It's no more expensive. Just slower if using a fast charger as the car / charger throttles back once it gets past 80%/

kambites

70,015 posts

239 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
Zetec-S said:
My (albeit limited) understanding is that it is proportionally more expensive to get that final 80-100% charge which is why I won't bother unless needed.
I don't think charging efficiency drops at the top end of the capacity. It just gets slower and wears the battery out slightly faster.

Zetec-S

6,512 posts

111 months

Wednesday 30th July
quotequote all
Ah ok, thank you both for the clarification beer