The art of electric vehicle vacationing

Long-distance travel in an EV is perfectly doable, especially if your car combines a practical motorway range with fast charging. It does require more planning than travelling in a petrol or diesel car: your real motorway range will be lower than the advertised figure, charging stops take longer than filling up with petrol and charging infrastructure still varies between routes and countries.

If you can start with a full battery, charge overnight at your destination and do not mind stopping every two or three hours, an EV can be a very pleasant holiday car. If you regularly cross countries under severe time pressure, cannot charge at home or depend on unreliable public infrastructure, it may not be the best fit for you yet.

First things first. The range shown in a brochure is not invented, but it is measured over a mixture of driving conditions. A long holiday journey usually involves hours of motorway driving, where higher speeds increase air resistance, draining your battery faster.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that an electric car with a mixed-cycle range of 400 kilometres can typically cover around 320 kilometres on its first motorway leg, when starting at 100% and stopping with 10% remaining. At an average speed of 110 km/h, that is nearly three hours of driving. After that first leg, the pattern changes. On the road, drivers rarely recharge to 100%. Fast charging is usually quickest at a lower state of charge and slows as the battery fills. Charging from roughly 10% to 80% is therefore often more efficient than waiting for 100%.

That means the distance between later stops will usually be shorter than your first leg. The dashboard estimate will keep adjusting as you drive, based on speed, rain, wind, hills and temperature. Heating or cooling the cabin uses energy too. In cold winter conditions, real-world range losses of 20 - 40% have been measured. The lesson is simple: plan with the range you are likely to achieve, not the largest number ever associated with your car.

A large battery is useful, but battery size is only one part of the long-distance equation. Charging performance may be just as important. Two cars with a similar range can behave very differently on holiday. One might maintain a high charging speed and be ready to leave after 20 minutes. Another may reach an impressive charging peak for thirty seconds before settling into a much slower session.

Look beyond the maximum charging speed and consider:

• How long the car takes to charge from 10% to 80%.
• How much range it can add in 20 or 30 minutes.
• Whether the car can automatically bring the battery to the right temperature before you reach a fast charger.
• Whether the navigation system plans charging stops automatically.
• Whether it adjusts the route when a charger is busy or unavailable.
• How charging performance changes in hot or cold weather.

According to the IEA, a 25-minute stop at a fast charger can add more than 200 kilometres of motorway range and the quickest chargers can add even more. The exact result depends on both the charger and the car, as well as factors such as the battery’s temperature and how full it already is. In other words, the number printed on the charger is a possibility, not a promise.

In a petrol car, a five-minute stop beside a busy motorway is tolerable. In an EV, you may be there for 20 or 30 minutes. That changes what counts as a good location. A charger beside a restaurant, supermarket, playground or half-decent coffee machine can turn waiting time into useful time. A charger behind an industrial estate, next to a locked toilet and one overflowing bin, has a different effect on morale.

An EV route planner can select chargers based on your car, battery level and expected consumption. Still, it is worth checking:

• How many chargers are available.
• Whether recent users report faults or queues.
• What charging speeds the site offers.
• Which payment methods or charging cards it accepts.
• Whether another charging site is within reach.

A location with twelve chargers is usually a safer holiday stop than one with a single charger, however convenient it appears on the map. Try not to arrive with an almost empty battery. Chargers can be busy, out of order or simply harder to find than expected, so leave yourself enough range to reach a plan B. Once you understand your car’s real consumption and Once you understand your car’s real consumption and know which charging providers are reliable, affordable and widely available along your route, the process often becomes routine. The unknown is usually more stressful than the journey itself.

Electric travel becomes less irritating when you stop treating every break as a technical failure to keep moving. After two or three hours behind the wheel, most people need food, coffee, a toilet or a good five minutes in which nobody asks whether you are nearly there. In the IEA’s example, you can drive for almost three hours before stopping to charge for 25 minutes, hardly an unreasonable rhythm for a long journey.

Charging works best when it overlaps with something you wanted to do anyway. Have lunch, visit a town, do your grocery shopping, or sleep: choose accommodation where you can charge overnight. That way, the car is ready in the morning and you can start the day with your journey rather than a search for the nearest charger. The car does not require you to stand beside it watching electrons enter. It will manage without emotional support.

Charging on the road is not automatically cheap. Home charging remains the most affordable option in many markets. According to the IEA, public slow charging can cost up to 150% more than residential electricity, while public fast charging can cost up to 240% more. Prices vary between networks, countries and payment methods. Some providers charge per kilowatt-hour, while others add a session or time fee. Using one charging card across different charging networks can be convenient, but it may cost more than paying the operator directly.

Before travelling, check which networks dominate your route and whether a subscription would genuinely save money. Do not subscribe to six providers out of panic. That is how you return from holiday with a tan, a collection of charging cards and several recurring payments you no longer understand. Cheap charging at your accommodation can compensate for more expensive motorway stops.

An electric car is not automatically the right choice for every traveller. Think carefully if you regularly cover very long distances under severe time pressure, travel through regions with limited or unreliable infrastructure, cannot charge at home or at your destination, or depend entirely on expensive public fast charging.

A short-range EV designed mainly for urban use may be brilliant for everyday driving and deeply annoying during frequent cross-continental trips. Buying an enormous battery for one annual holiday may not be the smartest answer either, especially if you rarely need that capacity during the rest of the year.

There are alternatives. You could accept a longer travel day, use a train for certain journeys or occasionally rent a different car. The best choice depends on what you do most often, not on the most demanding trip you can imagine. And if your real life involves regularly towing a large caravan or travelling with half the contents of your home strapped to the car, that calculation changes again. We will save that particular aerodynamic adventure for another article.