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    Cost to charge an electric car at home per month

    Updated

    Home charging cost comes down to three numbers plus one assumption: how much energy your battery holds, what your utility charges per kilowatt-hour, how often you plug in, and how much energy is lost while charging. The headline figure below is the electricity you buy from the wall — losses included — with the battery-side cost shown separately, plus cost per mile and a public-charging comparison.

    Typical EV: ~75 kWh

    Your home rate, from your utility bill

    Full-battery equivalents

    Assumptions: charging losses, mileage and public-charging comparison

    The charging-loss percentage is an adjustable assumption, not a universal value — it feeds the headline utility cost. Mileage and the public rate only refine the interpretation below.

    Default 10%. Level 2 home charging is commonly 5–15%; set your own.

    Per charge
    $12.38
    Per month
    $99.00
    Per year
    $1,188.00
    Charging at home adds about $99.00 a month to your electricity bill — the electricity you buy from the wall, including your 10% charging-loss assumption.
    How this was calculated
    Energy delivered to the battery, per charge
    75 kWh
    Electricity price
    $0.15 / kWh
    Charges per month
    8
    Energy delivered to the battery, per month
    75 × 8 = 600 kWh
    Cost before charging losses
    600 kWh × $0.15 = $90.00
    Charging-loss assumption (adjustable)
    10%
    Energy drawn from the wall, per month
    600 kWh + 10% = 660 kWh
    Estimated utility cost including charging losses
    $90.00 + $9.00 = $99.00

    What your result means

    Charging a 75 kWh battery 8 times a month at $0.15 per kWh puts 600 kWh into the battery, which costs $90.00 before charging losses. Adding your 10% loss assumption, you actually draw about 660 kWh from the wall, so the estimated utility cost is $99.00 per month — roughly $1,188.00 a year.

    Estimated cost per session (from the wall)
    $12.38

    75 kWh x $0.15/kWh = $11.25 into the battery, plus 10% charging losses. A partial top-up costs proportionally less.

    Charging losses you pay for
    $9.00/mo

    The gap between $90.00 of energy stored and $99.00 of electricity bought, at your 10% assumption.

    Cost per mile
    $0.090

    $99.00 ÷ 1,100 miles, on the same loss-adjusted basis as the headline figure. Before losses it would be $0.082.

    At 1,100 miles a month you are buying about 0.60 kWh per mile from the wall, of which about 0.55 kWh per mile reaches the battery. That figure is worth sanity-checking against your car's trip computer, which normally reports the battery-side number: if it is far higher, you are probably charging more often than you entered, or your real sessions are larger than a single full battery.

    For a first-time EV owner, the useful translation is fuel: covering the same 1,100 miles in an illustrative 30 mpg gasoline car at $3.10 a gallon would cost about $113.67 a month, versus $99.00 of home charging — $14.67 less for electricity. Substitute your own gas price and mpg if you are comparing against a specific car; the point is the order of magnitude, not the exact figure.

    Buying the same 660 kWh at a public rate of $0.35/kWh would cost $231.00 a month — an extra $132.00 versus charging at home. Both sides of that comparison use the same loss-adjusted energy. Public pricing varies by network, location and membership, and some stations bill per minute or add idle fees, so treat this as a comparison of energy price alone.

    There is no universally "good" number here. A driver on a $0.10/kWh rate covering 600 miles a month and a driver on a $0.32/kWh rate covering 1,500 miles are both charging sensibly and will see very different totals. The figures that are worth tracking over time are your cost per mile and the share of energy you buy at public prices.

    How to improve your result

    • Move charging to an off-peak or EV tariff$66.00/mo if your rate drops $0.05

      Only worth it on a time-of-use or dedicated EV tariff. The figure shown applies an illustrative $0.05/kWh reduction to the 660 kWh you buy each month — replace the rate field with your utility's actual off-peak price, and check the peak price and any fixed monthly charge before switching, because peak rates on those plans are usually higher than the flat rate.

    • Do less of your routine charging at public fast chargersUp to $132.00/mo versus all-public charging

      At $0.35/kWh, the same 660 kWh would cost $231.00 instead of $99.00. Every session you move from a station back to the driveway claws back part of that gap, which is why this is usually the single largest lever on the bill.

    • Cut the energy each mile needs$9.90/mo for a 10% efficiency gain

      Steadier speeds, correct tire pressure, less cargo weight and preconditioning while still plugged in all lower kWh per mile. Efficiency scales the whole bill: a 10% improvement takes $99.00 down to about $89.10. Model it by reducing the charges-per-month field, since you plug in less often for the same miles.

    • Set the charging-loss figure to match your own bill$9.00/mo at 10% today

      The 10% default is an assumption, not a measured value. At 10% you are paying $9.00 a month for energy that never reaches the battery; at 5% it would be $4.50 and at 15% $13.50. Compare a month of sessions logged by the car against the kWh your utility billed, then enter your real loss rate.

    Worked examples

    Example A — low-mileage commuter on an off-peak rate

    Battery
    40 kWh (Nissan Leaf)
    Home rate (off-peak)
    $0.11/kWh
    Charges per month
    6
    Miles per month
    550
    Charging losses (assumption)
    12%

    40 x 6 = 240 kWh into the battery → 240 x 0.11 = $26.40 before losses → +12% = 268.8 kWh from the wall → 268.8 x 0.11 = $29.57 → 29.57 ÷ 550 = $0.054 per mile

    $29.57 per month ($26.40 before losses) — about $0.054 per mile

    A small battery, a cheap overnight rate and modest mileage put home charging in the same range as a couple of coffees a week. The same 550 miles in a 30 mpg gas car at $3.10/gal would be about $57.

    Example B — heavy public fast charging (illustrative)

    Battery
    75 kWh
    Home rate (2 charges)
    $0.15/kWh
    Public rate (6 charges)
    $0.40/kWh
    Charges per month
    8
    Miles per month
    1,000
    Charging losses (assumption)
    10%

    Home: 75 x 2 x 1.10 = 165 kWh x 0.15 = $24.75 → Public: 75 x 6 x 1.10 = 495 kWh x 0.40 = $198.00 → total $222.75/mo → 222.75 ÷ 1,000 = $0.223 per mile

    $222.75 per month — about $0.223 per mile

    Same car, same miles, 2.25x the cost. To model a split like this here, run the calculator twice — once with the home rate and home sessions, once with the public rate and public sessions — and add the two monthly totals. (Public DC fast charging is usually metered at the dispenser, so real-world losses there are smaller than at home.)

    Last reviewed: July 9, 2026Last updated: July 9, 2026

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    Last reviewed July 9, 2026. Spotted an error? Report it via our corrections policy.