Most people shopping for a home charger worry about the charger. It is the cheap, simple part. The parts that decide cost and timeline are the ones nobody mentions on the product page: the electrical panel, the distance from the panel to the garage wall, and what the local utility and the building department require.
Drivers who understand those three things before the first quote have a dramatically easier time, and make a better decision about which charger to buy.
What we will not do
Electrical work. Installing a charging circuit is licensed electrical work with permits and inspection. We explain what the work involves so that you can talk to an electrician, and we do not publish wiring instructions of any kind.
Code and permit requirements. Electrical code, permit rules and utility requirements are set locally and change over time. We tell you that they exist and send you to your electrician, your building department and your utility.
Incentives and costs. We do not state current tax credit, rebate or utility incentive amounts, because they change and getting them wrong costs people money. We send you to the administering agency. We also do not quote installation prices.
Who we write for
Electric vehicle owners and people about to become one, with a garage, carport or driveway, who want to understand what home charging involves before they call an electrician.
Everything here lives in one category, Home Charging: what each charging level actually adds overnight, whether your home can support a charger, hardwired versus plug-in connections, smart charging and electricity rates, and where to put the charger.
How we work
- We explain the mechanism before the product. Knowing why charging speed is limited by the car’s onboard charger tells you why a bigger charger sometimes changes nothing. A list of recommended models does not.
- We give ranges and name the variables. Charging speed depends on the vehicle, the circuit, the charger and temperature. We never quote a single figure as if it applied to every car.
- We say plainly when you do not need the upgrade. A driver who parks overnight and drives modest daily distances may be well served by the simplest option, and we say so.
- We name the failure mode. Every installation choice has one. Each article says what it is and when you meet it.
- We update rather than repost. Vehicles, standards and utility programs change. When they do, the original article is revised and the change noted.
About the editor
Ayesha Brandt — Editor. Ayesha spent eight years as an estimator and scheduler for a residential electrical contractor in Colorado and California, where home charger installations went from occasional to a quarter of the calendar. She has walked through several hundred garages and learned that the charger itself is rarely the hard part, which is how this site’s editorial approach was formed. She writes PlugPoint Home for drivers who want to understand the conversation they are about to have with an electrician.
Corrections
Vehicles, standards and utility programs change, and we make our own mistakes. If you spot an error, tell us through the contact form and, if you can, include a source. Fixes are made on the page itself with a dated note, as described in our Editorial Policy.
How we make money
Nobody pays to be featured here. Income comes from advertising that outside networks place automatically and from some affiliate links, which may earn us a commission when you buy, at no cost to you. Neither shapes what we write: a good deal of our advice is to start with the simplest charger that fits your driving, which earns us the least. Our Editorial Policy and Disclaimer spell it out.
Get in touch
Questions, disagreements and topic suggestions are welcome through our Contact page. We cannot assess your home’s electrical system remotely, but we can usually tell you which questions to put to the electrician who quotes.